


Mona and Radko in Zootopia

by Wootzel



Category: Zootopia (2016)
Genre: ACTUAL COMMUNICATION Y'ALL, F/M, Fluff, Goodbye, Hi friends, I have really enjoyed writing it and thought maybe someone else would enjoy it too, I have updated the rating appropriately, I wanted to put them in zootopia, Interspecies Relationship, So yeah, and i really like writing about, anyway enjoy your stay, but they are not going to angst around for chapters on end, by the way this is going to be slow burn as all fuck, does not contain Nick or Judy, i refuse to use misunderstanding as a plot device for more than five minutes, if you don't like reading about original characters then cool, imperfect relationships, maybe I should put some actual tags here, no sex yet but I'll see what I feel like writing when they actually get there, okay so I have decided that there will be some sex and other various intimate things, probably not, so they're gonna have some issues to work through but it'll all be good in the end, they might get mentioned but meh, this is an au for some characters of mine, to help work on characterization without having to worldbuild first
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-10
Updated: 2019-01-23
Packaged: 2019-02-13 05:40:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 35
Words: 88,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12977235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wootzel/pseuds/Wootzel
Summary: When Mona first comes to Zootopia, her only focuses are getting through college and, eventually, finding a job in which she can help mammals who are less fortunate. She isn't really concerned about anything else, even when she can't find any other okapis in the city.Much of that changes when she meets Radko. He's very much the kind of mammal she wants to help--a homeless, jobless, aged-out foster kid who doesn't seem to have any prospects beyond his next meal. But he's stubborn and proud, and very unwilling to let her in. And hesmells.Still, Mona has never been afraid of a challenge, and she's nothing if not stubborn herself. She finds that she enjoys his company when he's not being prickly, and she is determined to help him whether he wants it or not.That is, until she realizes that she might be falling for him.





	1. In Which Mona Settles Into Zootopia

**Author's Note:**

> I wasn't sure how to start this, so I just... did. I think it came out pretty well.
> 
> Radko isn't gonna show up until at least chapter two, maybe longer, depending on how I section this out. 
> 
> I started out with small, widely-spaced sections. If this style annoys you, hang in there, because they're going to get longer and closer together (chronologically anyway) later on. If you like this style... sorry, mate. 
> 
> Enjoy!

Mona forgot to look back and wave goodbye.

It's not that she was really so nervous, just that she felt a need to focus on finding her seat. The train started moving so slowly and smoothly that she scarcely noticed it until she was sitting down. She looked out the window and realized that the platform, and her family, was far behind. She twisted in her seat and pressed her face against the glass in an attempt to get another glimpse of them, but the track had already curved and the distance was too great. She sat down properly with a small bump, frowning to herself. She had missed her last look at her parents before she left for more than half a year.

She shook her head to herself and took out her city map. As she pored over it, memorizing the route from the station to the Amazonian University of Zootopia campus, her family was already out of her mind.

 

 

Mona was early. She knew she was going to be, and that she had decided weeks ago that it would be better to be early, but it still made the tense feeling in her chest worse when she arrived at the meeting spot for orientation, the only student there with luggage in tow. She wasn't terribly conspicuous--her luggage was just a duffel bag and a backpack--so she looked more overprepared than out of place. At least, that's what she assured herself.

She sat in a chair near the wall and waited for the presentation to begin. 

 

 

The attendant at the hotel's front desk gave her trouble for a minute when he checked her ID. "We have a strict policy here," he said in a low growl, making the fur on the back of her neck stand up. "You shouldn't have even been allowed to book a room. You're too young. Who gave you the override?"

Mona didn't know the answer to the last question, so she answered the statement before it. "Yes, I know, but my mother called and she was told that I would be admitted. Please check for any notes about it--My name is Mona Johnstoni. My mother's name is Kayla Okasson. She spoke to a woman on the phone--might she have left you a note?"

He turned away, mumbling, and clicked several times on his computer, though he only moved the mouse once. "Johnstoni? My boss was saying something about a name like that. Spell it for me."

Mona did so, and waited as he typed it in and scrolled through some list on the screen. She watched his finger flick back and forth on the mouse; he was scrolling up and down, up and down, not actually going anywhere. Making a show of having difficulty finding the information, stalling her because she gave him something unusual and unwelcome to do.

He clicked once more, then grabbed a key off the desk. "I guess you're good to go," he said begrudgingly, and unlocked a drawer under the desk from which he pulled a key card in a little plastic sleeve. He set it on the desk in front of her, and she carefully picked it up and tucked it into her pocket at once. 

"Do you need any help with your things?"

"No, sir."

"Third floor. Enjoy your stay." He swiveled away from her and rummaged through the things on the shelf behind the desk, clearly making a show of ignoring her rather than actually looking for anything. 

Mona decided not to care about his ire. He had let her in, after all. She picked up her duffel bag and headed for the elevator.

 

 

In the week between orientation and move-in, she spent her days roaming Zootopia. Her goals were to find resources and haunts--places to eat, to shop, to go when she wanted to leave her dorm for a while--but she was also people watching. 

Never had she seen so many species of mammal in the same place. The rainforest district held familiarity, but it was grandiose in a way that a natural rainforest never was. There, she saw many of the same kinds of mammals she was used to seeing at home, but many others as well. Some were endemic to the rainforest, just from different parts of the world than she was, but others were from different districts and were passing through or had business in the rainforest district. She found herself stifling laughter when, on her first outing, she ended up on a sky tram with an arctic wolf who was panting so hard from the heat and humidity that she thought his tongue might fall right out of his mouth. 

It took three days before she started to get the first feelings of belonging. She began to remember routes to a couple of places, she explored the still-mostly-empty campus and found it lovely, and on the third day, the barista at the coffee shop she'd been frequenting remembered her name. 

 

 

Mona stepped onto campus on the first day of class in high spirits, but still with a twisty feeling in her chest. Though everything had gone well so far and she felt as prepared as she reasonably could be, there was still such a _newness_ and a _strangeness_ to it all. 

Her first two classes were as expected; she got general course information, and one let out early while the other began with the first lesson. Both were big classes in lecture halls, one of which was built right into the trunk of an enormous tree. Mona didn't have an opportunity to inspect it to tell if the tree was still alive after being hollowed out so; in fact, she wasn't sure it was a real tree. Some of the fake ones looked so similar to the real thing that it was difficult to tell. 

Her third class was much smaller, only fifteen students in all, and the teacher opened class with friendly discussion. Each student was asked to introduce themselves, which Mona did as briefly as possible. 

"And you are an okapi, correct?" The instructor, an elderly female pangolin, blinked at her from behind small glasses. 

Mona found herself blinking back. She had never had another rainforest mammal be unsure of her species; okapis were so distinctive that they could scarcely be confused with anything else. "Yes."

"The first okapi I've ever taught," she said, and offered a kind smile. "Thank you. Who's next?"

 

 

Mona stepped out of that same classroom on her fourth day of class and took a good, hard look around. Nobody had mentioned her species after that first day, but it had caused her to notice. In the two weeks she had been in Zootopia, she had not seen one other okapi, and she had become determined to keep an eye out for them. There had to be _some_ , right? 

 

 

Two more weeks went by before Mona, taking a break from studying, opened Furbook with a task in mind. For every major city, there were hundreds of species-specific social groups specifically to help mammals meet others of their kind when they might not otherwise, and she knew that she'd find more okapis there. 

Ten minutes of searching later, she let her hooves fall from the keyboard with a puzzled sigh. No combination of "okapi" and "zootopia" and other related words had pulled up any existing social groups. She'd found one that had not been updated in years, and some from cities closer to her home, but nothing useful. 

She pulled a face, but then closed the page and turned back to her homework. Perhaps the okapis in Zootopia were mostly older, or simply had their own society somewhere offline. At any rate, she had more important things to think about, and she pushed it to the back of her mind.


	2. In Which Mona Finds an Internship

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The sections are already stretching out, look at me go! 
> 
> Stay tuned next time for meeting Radko.

"I'm sorry, Mona, but I don't think I have anything for you." 

Mona did not react to that statement. For a moment her thoughts froze in disappointment and uncertainty, but then she blinked and glanced at the files in the paws of the capybara sitting across from her. "Nothing? The website the application was on said that there were hundreds of positions--"

"Yes." She set the files down, adjusted her glasses slightly, and huffed a small sigh. "We have positions, but... the intention of this program is to give internships to juniors and seniors. We get a few sophomores through now and then, but..." She peered over her glasses at Mona with a stern expression. "You have only one year of credits on your transcript, most of those core requirement classes, and the interests you marked down are very narrow. I only have three positions on record that match your requests _and_ that you meet the qualifications for, and each one of those has already been assigned to a junior or senior." She swept the folder with Mona's name on it--pitifully empty, with just the one-page printout of her application in it--off the desk and into her other paw, and promptly turned to tuck it into a filing cabinet beside her. "I understand that you are passionate about your field--I appreciate that very much--and that you need money, but there is nothing I can do for you. I suggest you take some sort of temporary work this summer, and come back to me when you have another year or two of classes behind you. Once you are a junior, you will stand a much better chance of getting placed."

Mona sat silently for a moment longer, then spoke up again. "What if--if I was less picky? I only marked down the sorts of positions that I really want to work in, but anything related to social work would do fine. Could you broaden the search?"

The capybara's sigh was more audible this time. "Perhaps I could. Still, the fact that you are a freshman will mean that it is very unlikely that you will be chosen for anything."

"Please try."

The glare the capybara leveled her with was definitely more unfriendly than stern. "I will. You will receive an email from me by the first week of summer, whether or not I find a position for you. But Mona. Do not get your hopes up. Look for other work, if money is going to be a problem for you. I give it little more than a butterfly's chance in a blizzard that I will find a position that will not be filled by a higher priority student. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Ma'am. Thank you."

"Indeed. Good luck on your finals." Her eyes were once more on her computer, but a little more warmth had crept into her voice.

"Thank you, Ma'am."

 

 

Finals week came and went; Mona sat her last exam, turned in her last paper, and refreshed her email hourly.

She finally saw the email she was waiting for while checking her phone during a break from packing her things. She didn't have much--clothes, laptop, a few notebooks, a few small keepsakes--so she was not so much taking a break as waiting for her new roommate to arrive, sitting atop her boxes outside the dorm building. 

Several other students wandered by--a gemsbok she knew by sight from one of her classes stopped to offer help with her things, but since she had nowhere to move them yet, she politely declined--as she waited, and she finally pulled out her phone to check if she'd missed any messages from Gezki, and saw the email. 

She'd just finished reading it when Gezki pulled up in her pickup truck, rolled down the window, and yelled to her. 

Mona got up quickly, pocketing her phone, and greeted her friend in return. The indri hopped out of her truck, dwarfed by it the moment her feet touched the ground, and came up to give Mona a quick hug. 

"Finals over with already? Damn girl, I think you gained another two inches since I last saw you. How are you? Oh hey, boxes." She stopped just short of the door she'd been reaching for, realizing that Mona had stopped next to her stack of boxes. "This all you got?"

"Gez, I've been living in a dorm."

"So you have, love. Welcome to the real world. Tell me you at least have bedding of your own?" she said, eyeing the boxes skeptically before picking up the smaller two. Mona grabbed the remaining two, and in a moment they had them in the back of the truck and were heading for the doors. 

Mona grimaced and shook her head in response to the question. "I have enough money left over to get whatever I'll need, though."

"Well, that's good." Gezki opened the door to her truck and leapt up into the driver's seat in an effortless bound. Mona stepped in on the other side, and watched her friend with amusement as Gezki started the truck. She had the driver's seat adjusted all the way up and forward in order to let her reach all the controls around the wheel and see over the dash. 

"You know this truck is meant for mammals more my size, right?" she asked skeptically, buckling her seatbelt.

"That's exactly why it's perfect for hauling your ass around in," Gezki responded with a cheeky grin. "Besides, it suits me just fine. I know it seems a little big, but my legs were almost too long for the next size down. Get to haul more stuff, bigger folks, and my vehicle is big enough to use the faster lane! It's a win all around."

Mona laughed. "Your logic is ineffable as always."

"You know it."

They shared a grin as Gezki rolled down her window and stuck her paw out of it. The nonchalance of her pose was ruined somewhat because her arm wasn't long enough to rest anything higher than her wrist on the edge of the window while sitting in the center of the seat.

"This truck looks pretty new," Mona commented. "Work must be going well for you."

Gezki shrugged. "It's four years old and pre-owned, but more'n good enough for me. But yeah, work has been going great. I mean, hell, I wouldn't have a two-bed apartment if it wasn't."

Mona gave her a puzzled look. "I thought you got that so I could stay with you this summer?"

Gezki scoffed. "Bitch, I don't need you." She smirked at Mona's dry expression, then amended, "Naw, I did start lookin' into two-bed places because of you, but I found a pretty decent one that I can afford on my own anyway. I'm thinkin' I may just keep it, year-round. NOT that you're getting out of paying rent to me, mind," she said, but with no heat to her mock-stern tone. 

"No Ma'am," Mona responded, her tone completely serious, and then they both burst out laughing. 

 

 

With Gezki helping her unpack, Mona was moved in to her guest room in half an hour. Gezki went back to the kitchen to see about dinner--she left with a sarcastic "I'll leave you and your vast hoard of possessions to get acquainted to this place."--and Mona sat down at her new desk with her same trusty laptop and opened her browser. 

She was halfway through catching up with everything that finals week had made her miss on Furbook when she suddenly remembered the email from earlier. She hastily opened a new tab and went to her inbox, and read through it again.

She checked the time and sighed. It was too late to go back to campus, but there was still tomorrow. 

Gezki popped her head in the door. "Hey, nerd. We still need to go get you some sheets. I don't have any for that mattress, figured you'd bring your own or something. Shall we make a trip to Pawmart and get takeout on the way back?"

"Sounds great, Gez. I'll be right out."

 

 

"Don't get your hopes up," the capybara warned before Mona had even sat down. 

"You said you have something, though? In your email?"

"I do. You won't like it, though." She opened the folder in front of her as Mona settled herself gingerly into the chair that was both awkwardly large and awkwardly low to the ground; a "one size seats most" that wasn't really a good fit for anyone.

"I only found one opportunity that is willing to take you. It's not an organization that we have done internships with before, but they contacted me earlier this semester because they need more help, and they passed the vetting process."

"What's the--"

"Let me finish, I'll answer your questions in a minute."

Mona sat further back into the chair, looking at her hooves. 

"Now then. They call themselves Helping Paws--not the only organization to have that name in this city, but nobody's trademarked it yet--and they are mainly a support group for adolescents and young adults who are about to age out of foster care, or who recently have. They have a few full-time staff who look after the support group..." She paused, flipped over the front page, and kept skimming the notes on the form as she spoke. "What they need help with is a program they've recently started, in which they put adults in touch with fosters who have recently aged out and need some help getting their lives together. Their initial target group was supposed be in their late twenties, at least, but they don't have enough takers, so they're reaching out to college students as well now."

Mona found herself smiling at the prospect. "That sounds..." She paused. "What wouldn't I like about that?"

She set down the papers and looked Mona in the eye. "It's not in the rainforest district, and it's unpaid."

Mona fixed her eyes on her hooves once more. 

"Oh, and you can only get one credit hour from it."

Mona remained silent for a moment, thinking, but then looked up again. "I don't think I can take an internship and work at the same time," she said carefully.

"If you were doing both full time, you're probably right. But this, according to the paperwork and conversations we've exchanged, shouldn't take more than a few hours of your time a week. That, along with the newness of their program is the reason we cannot give you more than one credit for it, though the position will last the whole summer."

Mona looked down as she thought, but wasn't given much time to do so. 

"Have your answer to me by the seventh. Email will do. I will email you all this information, so you can read over it and make up your mind." She turned away from Mona and started typing at her keyboard. "Do you have any other questions?"

Mona opened her mouth, but then closed it again and thought for a moment. "I'll email you if I still do after reading the information."

"Good idea. Shut the door on the way out, please."

 

 

Mona sat down at the kitchen table to look at the paperwork with Gezki, a kettle of tea in the middle of the table and mugs cooling on coasters beside them. Mona felt just slightly oversized around Gezki's furniture, but not uncomfortably so. 

"This is seriously the best they could offer you?"

Mona sighed. "It's just because I'm only a freshman. Even a year from now, they'd probably be able to find something better, but..."

Gezki chuckled and sat back. "You always were ambitious. Well, I guess with that in mind, this really isn't so bad? At least you've got something."

"It's...something. But its not very good."

"Okay, well, explain to me the pros and cons of doing this. Maybe it'll help you decide."

Mona flipped the nearest piece of paper over as she thought. "Well... I would get to work with foster kids... foster teens, anyway. It'd look good on my resumé. It's only a few hours a week. But... I would have to go to Savannah Central a lot, because the group is based there and most of its members live there. I wouldn't get any money for it. I would have to budget for transportation. I would have to get a job besides this, to pay--well, you. Among other things." She gave Gezki a small smile. "I would have to do it all summer, and would only get one credit for it."

"Well, do you _want_ to do it?"

Mona paused for a moment, but then pushed the papers away. "Yes. And... I guess there's really nothing stopping me. It might not be the best thing I could hope for, but I guess it's just take it or leave it at this point."

"And what if you take it but then decide that you can't do it after all?"

Mona thought for a moment, but then shook her head. "I'm not sure. I'd have to ask the adviser about that."

"And how long do you have to think on it?"

"Four days."

"Sounds great." Gezki hopped up from her chair and swept the papers into a pile. "You've thought on this enough for one day, go unwind for a little while," she said, putting the papers back in their folder, all out of order, and handing it to Mona. "I'm thinking pizza for dinner. What do you think?"

Mona shook her head. "I still have plenty of that salad mix I had for breakfast. I think I'll eat that. If you do decide to get pizza, though, I might eat one slice."

Gezki clapped her paws together once. "More for me!"


	3. In Which We Meet Radko

Mona's phone rang while she was on a break at work, three days after she attended the second meeting. She fished it out of its pocket and bit her lip when she saw the unknown number on the screen, but then decided to answer it anyway. 

"Hello?"

"Hi. Um." There was a pause just long enough for her to start to wonder, and then the male voice on the other end said, "Is this Mona John--Johnstoni?"

She blinked. She'd never thought her last name would be difficult to pronounce. "Speaking."

There was another pause. "Hi. My name is Rako. I, uh, I attend Helping Paws sometimes, they told me to call you."

When he didn't volunteer anything else, she gave a slight nervous chuckle and said, "Well, you've got the right person."

His nervous laugh sounded even more unsettled than hers, and then he mumbled another "umm," but didn't seem to know what to say.

"Well," she said, realizing it was going to be on her to get the conversation moving. "We're supposed to meet up in person--did they tell you that?"

"Yeah. Sorry."

She wasn't sure for what, so she forged on. "Okay. Is there somewhere convenient for you? I was told it has to be a public place for the first meeting. It can be the Helping Paws center, if you want."

There was another short silence, but then he blurted suddenly, "Is the Jackal and Lynx okay?"

She wracked her brains, but couldn't bring up any information about the place. "I'm not familiar."

"It's a café, it's a few blocks from Helping Paws. Uh. Is this your cell number? I can text you the address."

"That sounds great. When would you like to meet?"

She was met with silence on the other end. She gave him a moment, but when she still heard nothing, she said, "Hello?"

There was no response. She checked the screen of her phone, and realized that he had hung up. 

She dithered for a minute, wondering if she should call him back--had he actually hung up, or just lost connection? Did he think she had hung up?

Her phone buzzed, and she checked it to find a text with an address. She was typing a reply asking for a date and time when another text came through that said "2:00 tomorrow ok?"

She was about to respond, but then stopped. She texted back, "PM or AM?"

"PM. AM is ok if your a noc?"

"2:00 pm is fine. See you there tomorrow."

 

 

Mona got there early. The Jackal and Lynx was a nice little café with an outdoor seating area. As she probably should have guessed from the name, it catered almost entirely to predators, but there was one other prey there drinking a cup of tea, and the barista at the counter was a hyrax with so many piercings in her ears that Mona was surprised she could hold them up. 

She ordered a cup of green tea and sat outside, waiting where she could see the front door. 

Rako was not on time. Fifteen minutes from the time he'd specified, she was still waiting. She checked her phone but saw nothing, and sat sipping slowly and wondering if they had somehow miscommunicated about the time and place. 

She kept watching the mammals coming and going. None of them so far had been male and of about the right age, but she was starting to wonder if she'd have to start asking the other patrons when another mammal showed up. 

He looked like some kind of canine, dusty-brown in color with black spots throughout his fur. He had a short mane, which was gelled into a mohawk. He looked like he might be about the right age. He paused before going in the door and looked at all of the mammals sitting outside, but didn't meet Mona's eyes for more than a split second. 

He went in, ordered something, and waited at the counter for it, looking awkward and unsure. When he got his purchase, he asked the hyrax a question, and she nodded and pointed at Mona. He looked at her, met her eyes for a moment longer than he had before, then took his food and walked back out the door. 

He walked up slowly and stopped just short of the chair across from her. "Mona?"

She offered a friendly smile. "That's me. You'd be Rako?"

"Ra-duh-ko," he corrected, sitting down. He had a sandwich that looked to be mostly nut butter and grilled insects. Mona tried to keep from wrinkling her nose at the smell of it. A moment later, she realized that while she was smelling grilled bugs, she was also smelling him.

"Sorry for that cringey phone call," he said with a sheepish smile. "I'm not good at talking on the phone."

"It's quite alright," she assured. 

He took a big bite of his sandwich, then talked through it. Even for a predator he had big teeth, and Mona blinked and reminded herself to focus on what he was saying. 

"So, about me," he said, understandable even through his mouthful of food. "Radko Crocuta, eighteen, orphaned when I was three, tossed around in the system since then, but I suppose I've turned out alright." He stared at his sandwich with an intensity while he spoke, but met her eyes for a moment, swallowed, took another bite, and continued. "I like skating, used to anyway. Lost my board a while back so I haven't been able to lately. How'sabout you?" He flashed what he probably thought was a winning smile, but it looked more like a leer.

"Well." She took a sip from her cup and then folded her hooves on the table. "I'm Mona Johnstoni. Nineteen" She thought about mentioning her parents in response to his statement, but then decided it would be crass. "I'm the first of my family to go to college. I'm from Fioli." He gave her a quizzical look in response to that, so she explained, "It's south of here, across the sea--it's a rainforest city."

"Thought you looked..." he suddenly hesitated, seeming to rethink his words, "You look like a rainforest mammal, dark colors and patterns," he said, gesturing to her face and her hooves. 

"You're right."

He bit his lip, looking unsure, but then leaned forward and said quietly, "I'm sorry, I don't mean to be rude, but what are you? I've never seen a mammal that looks like you before."

She quickly smothered a laugh, and scratched her nose to cover it. "I'm an okapi. We seem to be pretty rare in Zootopia, but I know plenty where I'm from." Since he'd asked first, she decided that returning his question wouldn't be rude. "What are you?"

He sat back and raised his brows at her. "Really? You never seen a hyena before?"

She blinked. "Not one with a mane. Well, not in person, either. Most of the mammals in my hometown are rainforest animals."

He snorted. "Yeah, I'm... a bit weird. My dad was half striped hyena, and I inherited his hair," he said, gently patting the gelled spikes sticking up from the top of his head. 

A moment later Mona realized that she hadn't responded and that Radko was looking uncomfortable. She laced her ears back for a moment. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to stare," she said quickly. "I've never met a mixed-species mammal before."

He snorted. "Yeah, you and everyone else. Don't make a big deal about it, I'm just like anyone else."

"I'm sure you are!" she said hastily, and sighed at her own behavior. "I'm sorry, I'm... I'm like a country girl compared to most of the mammals here. I don't know the right way to behave, sometimes."

He barked out a yipping laugh, and Mona jumped, then laid her ears back in embarrassment because she'd jumped at something as innocuous as a laugh. 

"I'm pretty sure that's why they assigned you to me," he said, rolling his eyes. "Most mammals don't like how I behave, and they've been trying to turn me into a model citizen for years." He shrugged. "None of it sticks, though, because I don't want it to." There was pride in his voice.

Mona wasn't quite sure what to say in response to that, but she decided that as long as they were on the topic, she should start asking the important questions. 

"So, the guidelines they gave me were pretty broad, but they boil down to: I'm supposed to offer you help, as I'm able, with anything you need help with."

"They told me something like that. 'Bout all they said, though."

"So... what do you need help with?"

He groaned and crossed his arms. "I don't, really. I don't fit their mold, so they stick me with," he waved a paw at her, "no offense, but you. Not that I have anything against you, but, whether you wanted to be or not, you're just another way for the state to keep an eye on me. They're afraid I'm gonna make more trouble."

Mona nodded towards his ankle, where she had noticed a suspicious lump under the leg of his jeans. "Is that what that's for?"

He shifted uncomfortably and sat forward again, resting his still-crossed arms on the table. "Damn, I was hoping you wouldn't notice that."

"Maybe you shouldn't have worn skinny jeans, then."

"Touché." He grin-leered at her again, but his expression quickly dropped back into a slight scowl. "Got done originally for dealing when I was seventeen. A few probation violations later, and they stuck me with this thing. I been in juvie a few times, but the judge who's been dealing with me is determined to keep me out of prison for some reason."

"Maybe the judge likes you."

"Don't see why, I haven't done anything to make her like me." He grumbled, but then gave her a shrewd look and schooled his expression. "So, look. I don't really need any extra help--I've got the support group and my case worker--but Helping Paws is determined to stick us together, so how about this. Once a week, we'll go do something wholesome together--you can choose what--and you tell them I'm being a model citizen when they ask. I get some brownie points, you get your volunteer hours or whatever you're doing this for, and we both win. Yeah?"

Mona's ears twitched as she thought. "That's not what they told me--"

"Yeah, I get it," he said, and leaned towards her, folding his paws on the table. "Look, Helping Paws has me on their at-risk list because of my past offenses. They have easily two hundred mammals they're working with, so they can't know all of us individually. They keep trying to throw more things at me that are supposed to help, but I'm doing just fine on my own. I turn some of them down when I can, jump through their hoops when I need to, to make it look like they're 'making a positive difference in my life'." He made quotations with his fingers and rolled his eyes mockingly. "You know, court mandated stuff."

"Honestly, I have no experience with--"

"Cool, welcome to the club," he said with a sneer, then stopped, closed his eyes for a moment, and leaned back. When he opened them again, his easy smile and relaxed demeanor was back. "Sorry. I'm not mad at you. It gets a little old, having to jump through the state's hoops for years, you know?" 

"I see."

"So, honestly, you seem like a nice person, but you understand, this is just another hoop for me. We'll spend the summer doing this thing, and then we'll probably never see each other again." He paused, shrugged sheepishly, and said, "I'm not saying it's gonna be bad. I'm a pretty friendly guy, I'm sure you're great, and I'm sure we'll have some fun. This is better than some state employee breathing down my neck all the time, and they still get their progress reports on me."

Mona didn't respond. She wasn't sure what to say. All of her reading and classes should have prepared her for this--she couldn't count the times she'd read something along the lines of "Mammals who age out of the foster system are often left without support systems and are at higher risk for criminal behavior and psychological problems. Many are disillusioned and do not trust easily." Still, she was left feeling baffled and without any connection to Radko. As much as she wanted to offer help, he had to be willing to accept it first. 

"Okay," she said finally, "but... if you do need help with anything, you'll come to me, right?"

"Of course," he said with a friendly smile, but his lips were twitching, and Mona realized that he was being sarcastic. 

"Fine." She felt a frown on her face, but she didn't have enough patience left to banish it. "What do you want us to do together?"

He pursed his lips in thought, tapping his pawpads together. "My parole officer is always on me to volunteer more, so how about we find some place to do that."

"Like where?"

"You pick," he said, shrugging. "That'll look better than if I choose."

"...Okay. When are you free?"

He shrugged and spread his paws wide. "I don't have a real job right now, so I'm free any time."

"Okay, well I'll do some searching around Savannah Central--"

"Wait, you're a rainforest mammal, aren't you living in the rainforest district?"

"Yes?"

"Pick somewhere there, then."

She tilted her head. "Why?"

"I have a free bus-and-tram pass and all the time in the world, I can come to you no problem. Besides, my parole officer keeps getting on my case any time I leave my neighborhood without a good reason--and holy hell does that get boring."

"Okay," she said, relieved that she wouldn't have to make the trip every time they met up. "I'll text you once I get a chance to do some searching."

"Sounds great," he said, picking up his abandoned sandwich again. 

"I'll... see you soon, then," Mona said, checking to make sure that her phone and keys were in her pockets, and taking the last sip of her tea.

"Toodles!"

Mona left, feeling much less confident than before that either of them were going to get anything good out of their summer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, I am bad about forgetting to update. Whoops. 
> 
> Hope you enjoyed Radko. He's going to be a little shit for a while.


	4. In Which They Volunteer

As soon as Mona walked in the front door, Gezki looked up and said, "Ooh, I'll make some tea."

Mona didn't say anything. She sat down at the table and stared at the back of the chair opposite her until Gezki moved into her line of sight, setting a mug down in front of her. 

Gezki waited. Mona briefly thanked whatever gods there might be in the world for Gezki's patience, sipping her tea slowly and trying to assemble her thoughts. She had had some time to think while on the bus and then the sky tram that took her back home, but her thoughts had been an unorganized storm for most of that time. 

She was halfway done with her mug when Gezki spoke. "So, it didn't go well?"

Mona sighed. "I was hoping that this would be pretty easy, and that I would make a difference in someone's life, but..." She rubbed one hoof over her face. "I mean, maybe it still will be? Easy, that is."

"What happened?"

"Well, it seemed okay at first--he was sending some weird signals, acting pretty friendly but he seemed uncomfortable--but towards the end he just went into a rant about how I was the state watching him, and tried to make a deal with me."

"The state? A deal?"

Mona groaned and explained that part of their conversation in more detail. "I wasn't sure what else to say and I was starting to feel frustrated with him, so I just... left," she finished.

Gezki reached over and took one of Mona's hooves in her paws. "People don't change easily."

"I'd almost rather easy than... this. This is going to be a hell of a challenge."

Gezki shrugged. "It doesn't have to be. You can just take his deal, you know. Nobody will fault you for trying but not making any real difference. He's not your responsibility, you know."

Mona looked at her with her ears back. "He kind of is."

"Not more than superficially, and not for any longer than this summer. You might be able to help him out, but you can't be expected to turn someone's life around in a couple months. Hang out with him, give it a shot, and don't beat yourself up if he resists your charms, okay?"

"Ugh, Gez," Mona grumbled, pulling her hooves away. She could feel a blush heating her ears.

"Ha! Is he handsome?"

"Ew, no."

"Really? What did he look like? Hell, what species is he?"

"Hyena. He was dressed in preppy clothes, had his mane in a mohawk. He kept talking with his mouth full. And he had this _smell_. Most predators sort of reek, but... it was pretty bad."

Gezki gave her a look and laughed. "Wow, okay, I see why you say ew."

"Mhmm. Besides, he... he didn't seem very repentant about whatever got him in trouble. Hell, he's probably still involved with petty crime."

Gezki snickered and hid her grin behind her long fingers. "Well I hope you have fun hanging out with your new punk friend. Don't forget to call me if you snort too many pots and blackout."

"Oh my gods Gezki, I am not that naive. You don't snort pot, and--" she stopped talking as Gezki burst out laughing. "Ass," she said, sticking out her tongue at Gezki and trying to hide her grin.

 

 

When Mona got home from work the next day, she sat down to do some research. There were hundreds of places that she could pick, all easily found online, and she was sure that there were many more that were not; all she had to do was find a few decent ones that weren't too hard to get to from her home or Savanna Central.

An hour later she found herself flipping back and forth between the three tabs she had open, unable to decide which of the posted opportunities she had pulled up would be a good one to choose for her and Radko to do. Finally, giving up on her own ability to pick, she grabbed her phone and texted him. 

_Children, gardening, or litter cleanup? For the volunteer thing._

She left the tabs open and put her computer to sleep. She went and grabbed a book from Gezki's shelves and headed back to her desk, and was surprised to hear her phone ding just as she was opening the book. A quick response.

_Tough call, they all have pros and cons. Which do you want to do?_

__

__

I have no preference.

_What's the weather schedule say?_

She spent a little time checking the website for the city's climate control modules, then responded, _Clear._

_Gardening. We can do the others the next times._

Satisfied with that response, she texted him the date, time, and place of the gardening event, and received an affirmative response. 

 

 

Mona was early. She was always early when she could help it, and usually found it to give her an advantage in preparedness, but this time she was left standing around, trying not to get in the way. Nobody who had arrived had the right information to tell new volunteers what to do, and so many things were being moved that every time Mona found somewhere to stand, she realized that she was in the way again. 

Radko showed up early as well, though not nearly as early as she. He was dressed more casually this time; he was wearing cargo shorts and a t-shirt, and his mane flopped on his neck, entirely ungelled. She was relieved to see him; though she still didn't know quite what to do, at least now she had someone to stand around with. Being the only awkward one always made her skin crawl.

He padded up to her with a friendly, slightly shy smile, almost stepping on a rabbit's toes because he wasn't looking where he was going. 

"So, what are we gonna be doing?"

She looked around. "I don't know. The mammal we're supposed to meet isn't here yet." She turned suddenly as a sound behind her got her attention, and mumbled, "Oh, get out of the way," quickly moving away from the stack of boxes they'd been standing next to. 

"Well hell, what are we doing in the middle of everything, then? Let's go, uh... over there?" He pointed to a bench just across the street from the commotion, and she followed without comment.

They sat for a minute or more in silence, watching mammals bustle around across the street and avoiding looking at each other. Mona began to realize that there were only about six or seven mammals going back and forth, now that she was watching from a distance and not distracted by worrying about staying out of the way. Nobody seemed to be in charge, though occasionally one of them would consult another about something. 

"So you're doing this for college, right? What are you studying?"

Mona blinked and looked over at Radko. He was picking at a small plant growing out of a crack in the sidewalk with his toes, but he looked up at her with a friendly expression when she turned her head. 

"Social work."

He blinked. "Wow, okay, this makes total sense now. So, what, you have a burning need to help people?"

She found herself hesitating; on every application for every university and every scholarship she'd said something like that, but she figured that someone like Radko would prefer the truth. "Not... quite," she admitted. I do really like helping people, and I am pretty good at it, generally." She realized that her ears were laid back in annoyance as the conversation reminded her of his insistence that he needed no help, and she quickly pulled them back into a more forward, neutral position. "But I decided to study social work because... it seemed like a good fit. I'm not good at math, and I did like science as a kid, but then I realized that..."

"Most science turns into a buncha more math past high school, yeah?"

She nodded. "Exactly!"

He looked back at the plant he was still fiddling with. "I thought about applying for college when I was still in high school, and I started to notice that all of the science majors seemed to require a lot of advanced math courses."

"Are you still planning to go to college?"

He shrugged and shook his head. "Can't."

"Why not?"

"All the scholarships want a decent GPA. Mine was shit for most of high school, barely scraped by. Besides, I really don't think that more school would make me anything but miserable."

Mona was silent. She wasn't sure how to respond to that at all. She'd just been mentally gearing up to explain the way that she got into college and got most of it paid for, but he was right. Without a good GPA, he'd have to take out loans to afford to go, and because he had no family, he probably had no credit, and nobody to co-sign for him. 

"Hey, that sheep looks like he might be in charge," Radko said, pointing to another mammal who had just arrived and was now standing in the middle of a loose circle of the others, "Let's go ask him."

 

 

They got assigned to a simple job--plants in pots would be set out on the ground and arranged how they were to be planted, and as each section was arranged to the director's satisfaction, others were to come along and put each plant neatly into the ground. They were instructed to be careful not to bury any deeper than others, or to mess up the spacing while they were digging. 

At first, they worked side by side, but before long they ended up with a system. Mona found that digging with her hooves quickly got grit and bits of mulch wedged painfully in the frogs, but Radko enjoyed tearing into the dirt with gusto. He would dig each hole--and he was better than she'd expected at getting the shape, size, and placement of them correct--and she would put the plants in the ground. Scooping dirt back into the holes and patting it down was easy enough to do without paining herself, but she knew that she'd have to spend a good few minutes with a scrub brush to get all of the dirt off her hooves. 

Though they had some time to converse, mostly they did not. They exchanged what words they needed to coordinate their efforts, but Mona couldn't think of anything to make conversation about, and he didn't seem to have any desire to speak up either. He did, however, move the pots around a couple of times and got the order wrong. Mona couldn't tell if he was doing it on purpose or just wasn't as aware of the pattern as she was, but she found herself fixing them. He didn't seem to notice.

When they finished planting, they went back to the ram in charge and were told to haul mulch. The rabbit that Radko had almost stepped on earlier, along with two other small mammals, scurried around under the plants, packing the mulch in tightly. Mona found and borrowed a shovel to use to scoop mulch, and Radko dug in with his paws again--until he got a third splinter between his pads. 

"I'm sure you could find a shovel, too."

He grabbed the splinter between his teeth and tried to pull it out, but the end in his mouth splintered even smaller. He spat it out and let out a small whimper, biting his lip as he inspected the rest of it. "I honestly think you might have the only one here. Most of these mammals have good paws for digging."

"Let me see that," she said, and he held out his paw with a disgruntled expression. She inspected it as well, but let go of his paw after a moment. "I don't think I could get ahold of it. You'll have to get it with tweezers when you get home. Just try not to push it in anymore in the meantime."

He sniffed it carefully, then mumbled something.

"What?"

"Don't think I have a tweezers."

"Well, you can get some at a drugstore?"

He made a noncommittal grunt and nodded, then grabbed the handles of the wheelbarrow--gingerly with his left paw, she noticed--and rolled it over to the bed where it was to be dumped. 

After the garden was complete enough that they were out of tasks--it had only been three hours, with the number of mammals working--Mona bid Radko and the others they'd been working with goodbye and headed back to the bus station that she'd arrived at. She heard Radko speaking to the old ram, as she left, about vouching for his volunteer hours, and she smiled to herself.


	5. In Which Radko's Paw Hurts

_Litter cleanup or children tomorrow?_

She set her phone down, but picked it back up a minute later. _Or I can find something else, if you would prefer._

She didn't get a response until several hours later, and she was starting to wonder if he was going to answer at all.

_Don't care._

_Litter cleanup, then?_

She didn't get a response, and an hour later she sent him the time and location. 

 

 

The next day, she checked her phone and still saw no response. She waited until two hours before the meetup time, then called him. She sat listening to the ringing tone for almost thirty seconds before he answered. 

"Um, hi?"

"Hey, it's Mona."

"Yeah, um, my phone knows you."

"Ah. Well I was wondering if you were coming to the thing today."

He muttered something way too quietly for her to make out, and there was a brief shuffling noise. "Oh yeah, sorry," he said after a moment, "I got the information. I'll be there. Sorry I didn't text back, I was sick yesterday."

"Are you okay? We don't have to meet today if you're still sick, you should stay home and take care of yourself."

He gave a small, short laugh. "Nah, I'm fine. My fever is mostly gone. It'll do me good to get out in nature, probably."

"Okay, as long as you're sure."

"Yeah, I'm all good."

"Okay." She sat for a moment, trying to decide if there was anything else she needed to tell him, biting her lip as she thought. "Oh, uh, the address I sent you is of a bus stop on a street corner. It isn't where the group is meeting, but it'll take us to the right place."

"Okay. Uh, should I get on the bus when I get there if it's there, or wait for you?"

"Wait for me. The time I sent you is a little early. Unless you'd rather travel to the meetup separately, I can text you that." She paused for a beat, then said, "I'll go ahead and text it to you just in case we get separated or one of us is late."

"Okay."

"Well, see you in a couple hours."

"Seeya."

 

 

Mona was early, as always. The bus stop had a small shelter with a few benches of varying sizes, and Mona sat in a corner to wait. It was misty out, as it almost always was on the rainforest floor, and the damp air made all the scents of wood and leaf litter and mildew stronger. 

Radko arrived late--only two minutes before the bus was due, according to the schedule--looking disheveled and unhappy, with a scarf loosely wrapped around his muzzle. 

"Hi," he mumbled, sitting next to her, but far enough away that they could have fit two mammals her size between them. 

"Hi. Are you feeling okay?"

He nodded, but didn't look her way. "The air is dank down here," he explained, "I'll lose the scarf when we get off the forest floor."

She made a quiet noise of assent, and they sat in silence for the next minute.

When the bus pulled in, Radko didn't seem to notice it until it was right upon them. He got up and followed Mona onto it. She found a seat near the back--one of only a few open that were of an appropriate size for her--and he carefully perched on a much larger seat next to an elephant. 

As the bus got moving, Radko tucked himself further into the seat so that he wasn't sitting on the edge of it, drawing his feet up. Because of their positions, he was facing slightly away from her and she towards him, so she had an opportunity to study him. He stared out the window like a creature stupefied, not focusing on a single thing even though his gaze didn't move. 

He was more disheveled than she had seen him before. His shirt was wrinkled and had a stain that looked suspiciously like an old bloodstain near the bottom hem, and his fur was rumpled. His mane, though not very long, looked a little tangled in one spot. There was a dry, tired look to his eyes. After a minute on the bus he reached up and pulled the scarf down from his muzzle. He looked just unkempt enough to make her wonder, but not enough to really draw attention to himself. She mused that whatever he'd caught must have done a number on him, and pushed the thoughts out of her mind. 

When they arrived at the right stop, she got up and headed for the door. Radko sat still until she walked by, then suddenly stood up to follow. 

They stepped off the bus, and Mona lead the way along the street. They were getting close to the edge of the rainforest district where it bordered the meadowlands, so the trees weren't as tall and the roads and walkways built above ground level had all but vanished. Radko took off his scarf and shoved it into the thigh pocket of his pants, where it made a large lump. 

"So where are we picking litter today?"

"The website I signed us up on said that they aren't often sure of the location until it's time to go, but we're to meet in a lot a block further this way and we'll be shuttled to the location."

"Mmkay."

 

 

Just as they were getting onto the van that would take them to their cleanup location--which was only a mile into the meadowlands--a light rain started to fall. Mona and Radko both looked at the sky, then at each other. Radko shrugged, and stepped onto the bus. Mona followed. Rain had never bothered her--besides, it would look rather silly of them to duck out because of a little weather when nobody else who was getting on the van seemed to even pay attention. 

The van was sized for animals a little smaller than Mona. Radko looked a little large for it but was not uncomfortable, but Mona found that her legs felt cramped and her ears kept brushing the ceiling. The bench seat that she was sharing with Radko was just big enough to hold both of them without forcing them into contact. The other mammals there were friendly, but most of them clearly knew each other well and were more interested in catching up than talking to the new guys. There was one--some kind of small cat--who eyed Radko with something that Mona thought might be wary recognition, but didn't attempt to catch his attention. 

The ride was mercifully short. Mona was one of the first to clamber out when the van stopped, but Radko remained in his seat until the others were out. He gave her a brief smile when they made eye contact as he climbed out, but then turned to pay attention when the driver started handing out trash bags. He stepped forward to get some, and came back to Mona with two and handed her one. 

"These are... small..." she commented quietly. 

"So is most of this crew," he said even more quietly, and she stifled a snort. "But that chap has plenty, so I'm sure we can get more if we fill them up."

The stretch of road they were working along was pretty plain. It had twenty feet of grass between the road and the fences on each side. The fences were more decorative than anything; within five minutes of starting, Radko climbed easily through the one they were next to in pursuit of litter. He stayed on the other side thereafter, because he kept finding more trash the more he checked the tall grasses. 

"Ugh, I'm getting tick-bit," he grumbled, scratching a little too close to his crotch for politeness. 

Mona averted her eyes. "Are you up to date on your Lyme's vaccine?"

"It's state-mandated, ain't it?"

"It is for children."

"Well, I got it as a child."

She put a paper cup in her bag and turned back to look at him between the fence's wires. "You're supposed to get a booster when you're sixteen, and one every ten years after that."

He shrugged. "Somebody told me that's just for paranoia's sake. I'm not that worried. Besides, isn't it pretty rare nowadays?"

She shrugged. "I think so, but there's still a chance."

"I live on the narrow side of chance," he remarked, flashing a toothy grin, and then bent down to dig an old plastic bag out of the depths of the grasses. Mona rolled her eyes at his back.

By the time their two hours had passed, they had walked almost half a mile and couldn't see the van around a bend in the road. Radko's phone chimed and he fished it out, hit a button or two that Mona couldn't see because of the angle and the spiderweb of cracks on his screen, and put it back away. "That's time," he remarked. 

She checked the time on her own phone and saw that he was correct. "You set a timer?"

"I figured we might get spread out," he said, gesturing around. Mona could only see one of the others, across the road from them and more than a hundred feet ahead, but walking back. 

"Good thinking."

He grunted his assent and reached over the fence with the garbage bag. "Could you take this for a sec? I don't want to try to drag it through the fence with me."

She grabbed the garbage bag, and frowned when she noticed that there was a small streak of some pink liquid on the outside of it. She looked at it closer, and the slight smell blood and putridity crept into her nostrils. She glanced at Radko, who had his back to her as he tried to get a thorn bush to let go of his shirt, and sniffed it a little closer. Beneath the tangy reek of hyena, she got a good whiff. It was definitely fresh blood, and it smelled terrible, like infection.

He finally made it through the fence and the bush and stood up next to her, and reached out for the bag, but she held it away from his paw. "What is this?" She asked, turning it so the smear was facing him.

"What is what, a trash bag? C'mon Mona, I thought you were smart," he said with a smarmy smile, but she saw his eyes go right to the smear, and he didn't make eye contact as he tried to grab the bag. She grabbed his paw and tried to turn it pad-up to inspect, but he easily pulled it out of her grip before she was able to get a good look at it. 

"It's nothing. I got myself on one of those thorns," he said, and made another grab for the bag. Mona underestimated his reach and he got ahold of it. She tried to resist for a moment, but gave up quickly rather than be pulled off her feet by his greater strength. 

"You handed me the bag before you got into the thorns."

"They weren't the only thorns on the roadside," he said, his expression and voice showing anger. Mona felt herself wanting to balk at the sight of his large, sharp teeth behind snarling lips, but forced herself to remain stoic. "I don't believe you."

He shrugged. "Your belief isn't gonna change the truth." Despite the bluster in his words, his eyes were darting back and forth and his expression was angry and strained. 

"Radko, you're bleeding and it smells infected. Please let me look at it?"

"I said it's nothing," he snarled.

She was silent for a moment, but then she laced her ears back and went back on the attack. "You know that infection can kill you if it's left untreated, right?"

He rolled his eyes but didn't answer.

"Does your paw hurt?"

He didn't answer, and intentionally picked up his pace to slog through the grass faster, but Mona's longer legs let her keep up pretty easily. 

"Radko, please. You could lose a finger or your whole paw if you don't get that looked at."

He laid his ears all the way back. "You can't scare-tactic me," he growled. "Mammals don't lose paws from little things like this."

She was about to snap back at him, when she realized that he believed what he was saying. "Radko," she said, stopping.

He grumbled and kept walking, but she didn't. "Please, listen to me for a minute."

With a long-suffering sigh, he stopped and turned around, paws in his pockets. 

"Do you remember what high school biology taught you about infections?"

"Ugh," he said, tossing his head in disbelief, and started to turn back around.

"No, really! I'm not trying to patronize you."

He glared at her for a moment, but then finally said "No." in a quiet voice.

"There are lots of nasty bacteria in your flesh right now, literally eating it alive," she explained. "Your body is trying to fight them. That might be why you felt sick yesterday."

"Still feel sick," he grumbled.

"That means the infection is still there, and it's trying to spread. It will slowly eat away at you. Maybe you'll get lucky and beat it on your own, but it might do more damage than your body can heal from."

He didn't say anything, but the anger in his expression had been replaced by worry.

"Please let me look at it?"

He seemed to debate with himself, then turned away from her again. "I'll let you look at it when we get back, I promise," he said begrudgingly. "Let's just go get on the van before they come looking for us."

Satisfied with that, Mona caught up with him and they walked back.

 

 

The unloading of the van was quick. Radko approached the driver about recording his volunteer time and was given a business card and instructions to send an email about it, and then they bid all the others goodbye and walked back towards the bus station they'd arrived at. All the while, Radko kept his paws in his pockets when he wasn't using them. Mona considered asking him to stop so that she could look at his paw, but he seemed determined to press on, and she didn't see an easy opportunity.

They found a pair of empty seats on the bus, but didn't talk on the way back. Radko seemed slightly more aware of his surroundings than he had on their previous bus ride, but with the added burrs and bits of grass stuck all over him, he looked even more disheveled than before. 

When they got off the bus, Radko paused and seemed to be waiting for Mona to direct him. She waited until the only other passenger who had gotten off at that stop walked away, then turned to him. 

"Let me see."

He pulled his paw out of his pocket with a slight huff and held it up for her. She took it gently and peered between his fingers until she found the wound; it wasn't hard to find, because all of the fur around it was sticky and matted with what had been oozing out. She carefully brushed his short fur out of the way and tried to get a closer look, but couldn't convince her eyes to focus with enough detail. She sighed and released his paw. 

"I didn't bring my reading glasses, so I can't really get a good look at it."

He dithered for a moment, mouth half open as though he was about to speak but had stopped. He carefully shoved his paw back into his pocket. "One of the splinters from last week wouldn't come out," he said at last. "That's what's making it hurt."

"You couldn't get it out with tweezers?"

He frowned. "I don't have tweezers."

"Who doesn't have tweezers?" she said, more to herself than to him, but his ears went back even further. "Not everybody has that shit, okay?" He snapped.

"I'm sorry," she said quickly, mind busy thinking. "Well, you really need to get it out of there. You should probably go see a doctor."

"Got no insurance."

"Aren't you covered under--" She paused and racked her memory, but couldn't remember the name. "That one bill? It's supposed to cover foster kids until age twenty-five."

He shrugged. "I guess, but I only ever heard of that. Never did get signed up by anybody who fostered me. The group home I kept going back to had their deal with some clinic that kept us patched up, and we were all just handled under the same policy.."

She grumbled to herself. "Well then--come back to my place, I'm sure Gezki can take a look at it, and we can try to see how serious it is."

He looked alarmed at the prospect. "You really don't need to--"

"Don't be stubborn," she interrupted. "I'm supposed to be helping you, now let me help."

To her surprise, he laughed.


	6. In Which Gezki Helps Out

Radko kept his paws in his pockets and his eyes on the ground for the first block of their walk back to Mona's place, and he trailed behind her. After a few minutes, he caught up with her. 

"So who is, uh--Gezki?" he pronounced hesitantly.

"My best friend, since we were kids. And right now, also my roommate."

"Is, um, Gezki an okapi too?"

"No, she's an indri."

He gave her a blank, confused look, so she added, "A kind of lemur."

"Oh." He made a face. "Lemurs always give me the willies."

"Why?"

"It's their eyes, I think. The way they stare. I feel like they can see through me."

Mona rolled her eyes. "Lemurs don't tend to stare any more than most mammals. They just don't, uh, blink very much?"

He looked at her incredulously. "That's exactly what I mean. They look at me and they don't blink, and... suddenly, I'm not sure what I was saying anymore. I get stuck on the eyes and can't even tell if they're smiling, or--"

"Lemurs do make expressions like everyone else, you know."

"Yeah, I know, it's just." He shrugged without taking his paws out of his pockets, then looked at Mona sheepishly out of the sides of his eyes. "I'm sorry, I promise I won't say anything stupid around your friend. Just uh, nudge me if she says something and I don't respond, okay?"

Mona rolled her eyes again. "Yeah okay, sure," she said in exasperation. 

 

 

Radko was grumbling and panting slightly by the time they got to the top of the winding staircase that lead to Gezki and Mona's treetop apartment. 

"You must have legs of steel if you climb this every day," he muttered, pausing on a landing to sit on a bench a little bit too small for him.

"I take the sky tram most days."

"Why couldn't we have taken the sky tram?"

"The nearest stop we could have walked to from that bus stop is a mile away."

Unable to come up with an argument for that but apparently unwilling to stop griping just yet, he started mumbling about infrastructure as he followed Mona up the last two flights of stairs. 

She unlocked the door and stepped through it, ducking just slightly as had become habit to avoid hitting her head on the doorframe. She heard Radko give an amused snort behind her, but ignored him.

"Gez, I'm back!" She turned and hung her keys on their hook beside the door. Gezki responded with a cheerful "Hay nerd!" from the kitchen, so Mona gestured to Radko and followed her voice.

Gezki glanced up from the book she'd been reading at the table as they walked in and said "Oh, hello." She glanced at Mona, then said, "Radko, is it?"

He blinked. Then blinked again. "Yes," he said, "How do you know me?"

Gezki laughed and pointed one thumb at Mona, who was fishing the first-aid kit out of a cabinet. "This one talks about everything. At least, to me." 

Radko snorted again, and when Mona turned around with the kit to look at him, he raised an eyebrow at her. Not sure what he was expecting, she turned back to the task at hand. She gestured for Radko to sit in the chair closest to Gezki, and set the first aid kit between them. 

"Gez, Radko's got a splinter in his paw and he hasn't been able to get it out. I was hoping that you'd be able to get it."

Gezki tilted her head slightly. "Ah, yeah? Lemme see the paw, there," she said, stretching her arms across the table towards him. Radko hesitantly offered his paw into her grip as Mona sat down at the other side of the table, and Gezki took it and began inspecting the wound. Her nose wrinkled at the smell, but she didn't let it stop her. 

"This is really embedded," she said, grabbing the little magnifying glass from the kit and looking at the wound even closer. "You been trying to get it out with your claws, I take it?"

"And my teeth."

Gezki nodded and set the magnifying glass back down. "Mona, a dish towel with some cool water, please?"

Mona got up and ran a dish towel under the faucet until half of it was wet, and set it down next to Gezki, who picked it up immediately and used it to dab at the spot on Radko's paw. He bit his lip and winced, but didn't make a sound.

After it was cleaner, Gezki inspected it once more, tilting his paw this way and that to check it under the light. "Well, I think I can get it out. It seems like what's left is in one piece. It's going to hurt, though."

"Whatever you need to do," Radko replied stoically. 

Mona went and got her reading glasses from on top of her desk so that she could watch more closely, and then leaned across the table to peer at Radko's paw as she watched Gezki work. With a pair of tweezers and a pointy implement that Mona thought was intended for cleaning teeth, she slowly teased the sharp little chunk of wood to the surface. Radko let out one whine when she poked it particularly hard, but held quite still the whole while, only his expression betraying the pain. Mona noticed, halfway through, that he had his right paw clamped over his left arm at the elbow, as though to forcefully hold it still. 

"Ah," Gezki said softly, finally pulling out the splinter and holding it up to inspect briefly before she set it on the table. With it gone, Radko's paw was bleeding slightly, but he had a relieved expression on his face. He started to withdraw his paw to look at it, but Gezki grabbed it again.

"You're not done quite yet," she informed him, grabbing the kit and fishing out the little brown bottle of peroxide. "This is going to sting like all hell, so brace yourself and hold still."

When she splashed a little onto his paw, he winced and gritted his teeth, but again kept his paw perfectly still. Gezki gave it a moment to clean the wound, even using her thumbs to pull it open a little further to let the peroxide in, and then grabbed the damp towel, turned to a clean place, and dabbed at the wound again. Satisfied that it was fairly clean, she released his paw. 

"Go run it under cold water for a minute," she said, gesturing to the sink, "And look very closely to make sure there isn't any more stuck in there. I don't see any, but another pair of eyes is always good. Hell, have Mona look too," she added as Radko turned his back, giving Mona a significant look and tapping the bridge of her own nose. Mona could almost hear her unspoken _now that you have your glasses and aren't blind as a molerat_.

Mona rolled her eyes and got up as Radko shut off the water. She waited while he inspected his paw, then she peered closely at it. Now that she could see it clearly, she was surprised at how red and painful it looked. Half his paw was swollen. 

"I don't see anything left in it."

"Me either," he said, and turned back to Gezki. 

"Come here, then," she said, and he let out a huff so tiny that only Mona heard it and went to sit back down next to Gezki. 

Gezki smeared antibiotic ointment into the wound so hard that Radko winced as she did it, and then bandaged it tightly. He looked annoyed, but didn't protest. 

"Now you need to keep that clean," Gezki instructed forcefully. "And keep the bandage on for at least twenty-four hours. Because it's an open wound, don't put hide-heal on it until it's closed enough not to bleed."

"Okay," he said, finally getting his paw back. He held it against his chest for a moment, then took a deep breath and relaxed as though he was forcing himself to. "Thank you."

"It's nothing, dear, really," Gezki said, waving a paw. "Oh, and this." She picked up the little tube of antibiotic cream and showed it to him. "Get yourself some of this and use it. You can't use it too much. That infection seems to still be local, and it's not a very nasty one, but it could get worse if you don't keep after it."

"Okay," he said again, and then glanced at Mona. 

Mona narrowed her eyes at him. On a hunch, she grabbed the tube from Gezki and handed it to him. 

"Just take this one," she said. Gezki gave her a questioning look, which she didn't try to answer. "You need to actually use it."

He rolled his eyes. "Yes, Mom," he said sarcastically, but took the tube and pocketed it. "I _will_ actually use it, don't worry. I have a feeling you'd sit on me and put it on yourself if I didn't."

Gezki burst out laughing. "Damn straight," she said, slapping the table. "Mona doesn't take no for an answer when she's got herself determined to help someone."

Radko didn't seem to know what to say to that, so he glanced around for a beat, and then said, "Well, thanks for fixing me up. I guess I'll be on my way. Nice to meet you, Gezki."

"Likewise," Gezki said, grinning at him. "And if your paw gets any worse, you can come back. I'm a nurse, so I can take care of the basics--or tell you when it's time to get your ass to a doctor."

"That she can," Mona interjected.

"Right," Radko said, and flashed an awkward-looking grin at them. "Seeya, then," he said, and made his way to the door.

Gezki waited until she heard the door close, then scampered to the front-facing window and peeked out after him. Mona considered scolding her, but decided that it wouldn't do any good, and went to sit at the table instead. 

After a moment, Gezki turned around. "He's a piece of work, isn't he?"

Mona shook her head in consternation. "I get the feeling that I'm only just starting to find out."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's only been a couple of days, but I'm trying to convince myself to write some more by posting more... let's see if it actually works.


	7. In Which Mona is Suspicious

Mona walked through the ADMINISTRATION door at Helping Paws five minutes before her meeting time. Hank, the antelope at the front desk, looked up and said, "Hello, can I help you?"

"I have a meeting with Dave."

"I remember you. Go on back, you know where to find him," he said, and turned back to his papers.

Dave had already seen her coming, and greeted her with a smile as she made her way back to his desk. 

"Mona, right?"

"Yessir."

"Great, sit down." He took a moment to consult something on his monitor, then looked at her again. "How are things with Radko?"

She hesitated for a moment. "Good, I think. He's stubborn."

"Do you feel as though he's made any progress?"

She frowned. "Yes," she said at length. 

"You hesitate."

"It's..." She paused to allow herself time to think then started again. "It's hard to define progress. Especially since the only things I know about him are what he's told me or what I've figured out. He's stubborn and doesn't think he needs any help from me, but... it's only been a few weeks, and I think he's warming up to me, so I would call that progress."

He looked concerned. "What would you say you do know about his situation?"

Mona couldn't think of much. "He's poor, he's out of work, and he's on probation. He doesn't like talking about himself much."

"Is that all?"

She ran over her recent memories, but then shrugged as an answer. "A few half-baked hunches, but nothing that I would bet on."

He sat back, looking disappointed. "Because you're just a volunteer, we can't give you any official information on him--it would be an invasion of privacy. You understand."

She nodded, but looked at him with confusion. 

"I don't work with Radko directly, but a staff member here who has talked to him a few times has come to us with some concerns. She knew him a few years ago, and she says that he's changed."

"From when he was what, fifteen? A lot can happen in even one teenage year."

He pulled a face. "Not how you're thinking, I think. She said that he used to weigh more, even when he was shorter."

"So he's lost weight?"

"Not in a good way, Mona. I don't know much about hyenas, but the mammal who told me this said that she thinks he's underweight. And there are too many other factors to be sure--aging out of foster care can be very rough on some mammals' physical and mental health--but she thinks that he might be showing signs of malnourishment."

Mona's eyes widened. "He's not eating enough?"

"We have no idea. He only comes here for support group meetings, and he's usually reluctant to talk to anyone beyond pleasantries and small talk. Still, seeing someone twice a week is enough to notice patterns."

Mona, as hard as she thought about the situation, found herself at a loss for words. 

"So," Dave said after a long minute of silence, "What have you been doing with him?"

Mona quickly shoved the other information to the back of her mind to think about later and focused on the question. "At first I was at a loss about how to help him," she started. She was partially explaining the situation, partially stalling for time so she could get her words in order. "But then he mentioned having to do volunteer work as part of his probation, so I started helping him find volunteer activities, and we've been going to them together."

Dave's expression brightened. "And how has that been going?"

"Pretty well. He's mostly been on time, and he seems to enjoy the work."

"What kinds of things have you done together so far?"

Mona told him about their three meetups. "And my roommate and I helped him get a splinter out of his paw that he got during the second one," she said, carefully leaving out the time gap and the infection.

Dave seemed satisfied. "It sounds like you're doing a good job. I know it can be frustrating when people are stubborn and refuse help, but don't allow yourself to get down about it. Just having a passive, positive influence in their lives can help past offenders stay away from old habits."

"If I'm anything, I'm patient."

"That's good. Well, Mona, is there anything else you want to discuss with me?"

She thought a moment, but then shook her head.

"Okay then. Remember that if you need anything you can give me a call or send an email. If I don't hear from you before then, I'll see you in a month?"

"Yessir."

"Have a good day."

"You too."

 

 

"You know, I kinda thought he looked a little bit scrawny," Gezki remarked, and sipped her tea. 

"Do you think he really is malnourished?"

Gezki shrugged. "If he is, I think it would be a minor case. Without getting to take a closer look at him or have a comparison of what he looked like before, it's hard to tell. Maybe he just lost a little weight and they were concerned. It'd be hard to tell without getting a doctor to examine him."

Mona pulled a face. 

"What, are you going to start trying to feed him now?"

Mona grumbled under her breath. "I feel like I should, but he'd probably see it as coddling and push me away. He's... he seems to get stubborn about the things that he actually needs help with. You should have seen how much I had to argue with him just to get him to come here for the splinter."

Gezki set her mug down and folded her paws. "It sounds like he's had a rough life. Maybe you can find one of your volunteer things that will let you assess the situation?"

"How?"

Gezki shrugged. "I don't know, but think about it. You have the ability to bring him into almost any situation you want. Find one that could give you more information."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another short one; it seemed a good place to pause, though.
> 
> Edit: Y'all let me misspell suspicious in the title and just leave it that way. I don't know who I'm more disappointed in, me or everyone who didn't school my ass.   
> (It's totally me, that's not your responsibility)


	8. In Which Radko Is Hungry

Mona's phone buzzed.

Okay but why?

She let out a soft sigh before she texted back. _It's just something I pulled up, I thought we might as well do a variety of things._

He didn't respond for almost twenty minutes, but then responded with, _I tried to Zoogle it and had to change my search four times before I found it. You dug hard._

Mona panicked for a moment. He was on to her. She mentally scrambled to come up with an idea that would ease his suspicions, and do so quickly enough that he wouldn't think she was lying. Five minutes had passed when she came upon a good one and hastily typed it out. 

_Actually Gezki suggested it to my_

A moment after she hit send she was cursing herself for being too hasty, and quickly typed: _*Me_

He didn't respond for almost twenty minutes again, and then he finally texted back:

_Okay, I'm not doing anything then._

Mona sighed in relief. 

 

 

"So have you ever been to a soup kitchen?"

Radko shot her a look; she wasn't sure if it was suspicious or just angry. "No," he said snippily.

"Me either," she said quickly. "I just wondered if you knew anything about it. I... don't."

"What, did Gezki just give you a time and place and leave you to figure it out yourself?"

"Pretty much." She opened her mouth to elaborate, and then decided that elaborating might sound more suspicious and quickly closed it again. 

"How much further is it? It's humid as balls out here."

Mona blinked extra hard as she suppressed the urge to roll her eyes. "Only a few blocks."

He didn't respond, and they were silent for a moment, until Mona added, "You're the one who said it was fine if I picked places in the rainforest district, you know. I can find others if the climate bothers you that much."

He opened his mouth to speak, but then glanced at her and closed it again. "Yeah," he finally said, "It's..."

Mona gave him a moment to find his words, but when it started to look like he wasn't actually going to continue, she prompted, "It's what?"

"I... I shouldn't be bitching about the climate here, it's not like it's that bad." As he spoke, his tail was flicking back and forth much more than usual, enough to catch Mona's peripheral vision. "I just, uh, I've been having a shitty couple'a weeks. Sorry if I take it out on you."

Mona smiled at him, but he was looking diligently at the ground in front of his feet and didn't seem to notice. "It's okay," she said quietly. "I think everybody should have the right to bitch a little now and then." 

He snorted as though trying to hold back laughter, and then gave up and laughed aloud. "Yeah, me too," he said, still not quite meeting her eyes, but smiling a real smile.

 

 

Radko's lip kept wrinkling in disgust, just enough to show the very tip of one fang. "I thought this was called a _soup_ kitchen," he groused, carelessly plopping sliced tomatoes onto sandwiches. 

"It's an old name," Mona said. She reached over and delicately snatched a slice off of the top of his bin, and tossed it into her mouth to avoid touching her face with her gloved hooves. He frowned at her as though he wasn't sure whether he should be okay with that, but she just went back to laying out cucumbers, and he turned back to his task. 

"Why don't they change it?"

"I don't know." She picked up the tray they were working on and turned to place it on the table behind them, then turned back just in time to see him slide the next one into position in front of them. "I guess because everybody knows what a soup kitchen _means,_ so it doesn't matter."

He wrinkled his lip again as he reached into the bin to grab another handful of tomatoes, and Mona paused what she was doing. "Do you want to switch?"

He glanced over, then looked at the tomatoes in his paws. "Cucumbers aren't much better than tomatoes," he grumbled. 

"They're less squishy?"

For a moment, his face looked pained as he struggled to hold in a laugh. "Okay, true. Switch me." He dropped the tomatoes back into their bin with a soft _splat_. Mona shuffled around behind him in the confined space as he wiped his gloved paws on his apron, and then she nudged him gently with an elbow so that he would side-step into the position she'd just held. 

"I can't believe you can eat these things," he said with disgust, resuming her task of layering cucumbers on top of the tomatoes. 

"I think they're quite good."

"Herbivores," he mumbled under her breath, and Mona laughed. "Yes," she teased, "You caught me. I might as well throw off my wolf disguise right now."

He snorted. "Yeah, yeah." He threw a single cucumber slice at her, and it bounced off her apron and hit the floor.

"Careful."

"Nobody's watching us, I looked," he assured, rolling his eyes.

 

 

After they finished preparing the sandwiches, they were moved to another station. This time it was Mona wrinkling her face in disgust, as Radko scooped cooked grubs into little cups by the dozen. She was glad to be able to put the lids on the cups, except that for each one she covered, another appeared at her elbow, smelling up the air as it waited for its lid. At first, Radko was focused on his task, but then he glanced up at her face and started snickering. 

"Who's uncomfortable now?"

"These have a _much_ stronger smell than _tomatoes._ "

"And they're _much_ more delicious!" He picked one up between his fingers and opened his mouth to pop it in, but then noticed that there was someone else around and put it back down in the scoop with a sheepish glance toward Mona. She snorted at his antics, and went back to scooping. 

 

 

As they finished up their tasks for the day, Mona tried to surreptitiously keep an eye on Radko. As Gezki had warned her that he might, he'd seemed oddly focused at times, oddly unfocused at others, and occasionally as something tasty-smelling (to him, anyway) passed by, he seemed to forget anything else was around. 

Once they had finished their food prep tasks, they were released for the day, and told that they were more than welcome to stay for a meal. Radko seemed slightly hesitant to accept, but Mona did so gladly, and he went along with her. 

Mona thanked her prey-typical excellent peripheral vision that allowed her to watch Radko easily without having to turn towards him. He had a tight enough grip on his plate that she could see his knuckles through his fur, and he piled it with so much food that he lost a grub to the floor as he followed her to a table. She sat down, affecting an easy manner as she began eating her sandwich, and continued to watch him without really looking at him. 

Radko was stabbing the grubs with a fork before he had even settled into the chair properly, and he shoved them ravenously into his mouth, new forkfuls going in before he'd even chewed the previous mouthful completely. Smelly grubs, chewed open-mouthed by a smelly predator just across the table from her was almost enough to put her off her food. He glanced up, and she didn't school the disgust off of her face quickly enough. 

He sat back and hastily forced down his mouthful. "Sorry," he said, "I'll chew quieter."

She almost quipped, _didn't your mother teach you to chew with your mouth closed?_ but then stopped herself when she realized simultaneously that he didn't have a mother anymore, and that he probably wasn't able to chew with his mouth closed. He had much less lip than an herbivore. Trying to cover up the awkward thoughts that she hoped weren't showing on her face, she quickly said, "What's the matter, haven't you eaten today?"

Radko silently stabbed more grubs and stared at his plate, expression clouded.

Mona looked down. It was getting on towards evening, much too late for anyone's first meal of the day. She stared hard at his averted eyes. "You haven't, have you? When's the last time you ate?"

His expression shifted from guilty panic to anger and slipped into resignation. "Tuesday evening," he said quietly, still poking at his food. 

"Why are you going hungry? Does anyone know?"

He glared at her. "I don't have a job," he snapped quietly.

She stared at him for a moment, not sure how to answer, and then frowned in response. "I'm not judging you," she said, suddenly aware that they were in a public place and this was clearly a sensitive subject for him. "I just want to help." She pitched her voice so low that his ears automatically pricked towards her to hear better. 

Radko, however, didn't answer. He shoved a grub in his mouth but chewed slowly and without his previous vigor, as though he was just using his full mouth as an excuse to avoid talking. 

"Radko, please let me help."

His expression hardened, but he still didn't answer. 

Mona took a bite, ordering herself to give him a minute before she pressed again. 

"Look," he said finally, "You just want to help the poor orphan boy, I get it." He stopped for a long moment--stopped licking grub out of his teeth, stopped poking at his plate, stopped moving except for slight twitches of his ears and face, looking like he was arguing with himself. "It's like I said when we met. You might be just a college girl looking to do some good for the summer, but I know you have to report back to someone and I know that they're keeping tabs on me. The state has been keeping a close eye on every one of us since we lost our parents. And any time they think I'm struggling, they swoop in. New foster parents, new group home, new social worker, new... everything. They've been moving me around my whole life, and then when I turned eighteen, they hustled me out the door with some meager assistance, but nothing really helpful. And any help that I've found since then has always had.. strings attached."

"Strings?"

"Yeah. Like shelters, they'll put you up for a while, but you have to meet all their regulations. Pass their drug tests, find work, be a model citizen. The bigger food banks make you fill out a neat little profile on yourself, and if you show up too often, they start sending state workers after you to try to figure out why you're not bettering yourself. All over the place, it's get a job, get a job, hold down work, don't ask for too much help, don't show up looking like--" he stopped suddenly, his face saying that he'd almost said something he didn't want to.

"Looking like what?"

"...Like a welfare case," he said quietly. Mona suspected that it wasn't what he'd originally intended to say, but she let it go. 

"So, what are you saying?"

"I'm saying that the reason I don't want to tell you anything is because you have to report back to someone else, and if they think I'm doing poorly, they'll start coming after me again. I'm only a few steps from prison as it is," He nudged her foot under the table, and she jumped and pulled it back, then realized that he was subtly waving his ankle with the tracker at her. 

Mona stared at her food, unsure what to say, and after a moment he went back to his. He was eating differently now; still like he was hungry, but he didn't seem to be enjoying the food. He shoved bites in his mouth and swallowed without chewing much. 

Mona returned to her sandwich, disquieted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys, I just got an Anne Pro, which is a bluetooth mechanical keyboard. IT'S SO NICE. Now I can type all the things anywhere. It remains to be seen whether this actually helps me write more in the long term :'D


	9. In Which Mona Hatches A Plan

Weeks passed. Mona continued to research and suggest a volunteer activity each week, and Radko went along with whatever she said with a quiet stoicism. He was not standoffish to her, but he did not volunteer anything either, leaving an awkwardness between them. 

The end of summer snuck up on her. The moment she noticed was in the middle of a conversation at work, when another mammal there mentioned signing up for classes, and she suddenly realized what the date was. 

She needed to sign up for _her_ classes.

This thought occupied her mind until she was halfway home, when another suddenly replaced it: her time working with Radko was almost up. 

 

 

"Why does this need to be special, anyway? Hasn't he been a jerk lately?"

Mona looked away from her computer screen and gave Gezki an incredulous look. "Not at all! I'm the one who crossed a line, remember?"

"And his behavior has been bothering you ever since," Gezki said, grabbing the mouse right out from under Mona's hoof. Mona tried to snatch it back for a moment, but experience told her that there was no way she was going to succeed. Gezki's paws were so much more nimble and so much better at grabbing than her hooves. She subsided and sat back in her chair as Gezki scooted hers closer. 

"Put that brain of yours to work," she said, opening up a new tab and clicking on Mona's bookmark for Furbook. "You've spent plenty of time with him by now--what are his hobbies? Hopes? Dreams?"

"He's pretty tight-muzzled about himself," Mona said immediately, but she started thinking back on previous conversations anyway. Though he didn't usually want to volunteer anything detailed about himself, he had begun to seem more comfortable as the weeks had gone on... until she tried to delve into his eating habits, that was. 

She finally gave up. Though her memory for conversations was good, she couldn't remember a time that Radko had willingly talked about himself. She emerged from her thoughts and looked to see what Gezki was doing, and blinked when she saw Radko's face on the computer screen. 

"Damn, this boy hasn't updated his Furbook in three years," Gezki said conversationally, scrolling through the small collection of posts that he had available to the public. Mona blinked again and adjusted her reading glasses, then leaned forward to peer at the screen. Gezki, noticing her attention, stopped scrolling. 

Radko at fifteen looked very different, but his expressions and body language were the same. Most of his pictures were selfies with other young mammals, most of them male predators, and most featured his large, cocky grin full of big, sharp teeth. His mane was shorter, and showed no sign of gel or spiking; his face looked years younger, and his fur was shinier and smoother. 

"Wow," she said quietly.

"Mhmm. Is it just me, or does he look like _hell_ now compared to these?"

"It's not subtle," Mona said, sitting back.

"Look at this one," Gezki said, scrolling back up to a picture where he was posing shirtless, shoulder-to-shoulder with another hyena, both of them throwing gang signs. "You can see his condition pretty well in this one. It's hard to say if he's just more toned because he's an adult now, but... he's definitely thinner."

Mona leaned forward again to inspect the picture. Gezki was right; younger Radko even had a very slight pudge to his belly, and a softness around his ribs and shoulders that he had since lost. His face looked rounder, and she realized that it was because his cheeks were fuller and his jawline less obvious. 

She glanced over the rest of the picture, then froze abruptly as she realized what the background looked like. With a tiny huff, she grabbed the mouse back from Gezki--who let her have it--and scrolled back down to a different picture that she had only glanced at before. This one featured Radko alone, another selfie, but in the background was a dingy little outdoor skate park, and tucked under his arm, only barely visible and only recognizable because she knew what she was looking for, was a skateboard. 

"A-ha!" she said triumphantly, sitting back again and pointing.

"Uh-huh?" Gezki looked at the screen for a moment, then turned back to Mona. "What?"

"I forgot until I saw this, but the first day we met, he told me that he used to skate a lot. He said he lost his board, but... I don't think he'd mention it if he wasn't still interested?"

"Yeah? He actually told you something about himself? I'm shocked."

"Honestly, I think he was just throwing in a hobby as part of his scripted introduction, but after seeing these... I think he was telling the truth about it being important to him." She scrolled back and forth a couple of times, pointing to various selfies--she noticed, now that she was paying attention, that at least a third of his pictures had various blurry skateparks as backgrounds. 

"Okay, so uh... what are you going to do about that?"

"Believe it or not, someone at work told me, like a month ago, about an afterschool program that her kid was begging her to take him to. Among other things, they teach little kids to skate. Maybe, if I get the information from her, I can set something up to let him work with them?"

Gezki smiled. "Well, it wouldn't hurt to ask."

 

 

Mona took a deep breath and, chewing on her lip, read over the text that she'd just typed in. 

_I'd like to properly say that I'm sorry for making you uncomfortable that day at the soup kitchen. I know that you are a private person and that I don't have a right to pry into your life, and I hope that you can forgive me for it._

_Because this is the last week of summer, I've set up something a little bit different for our weekly volunteer activity. I would like to surprise you with it, so please meet me at the Savanna Central bus station. I'll be at the Animalia Line terminal. Please arrive no later than 2pm. I hope this is okay with you, but if it really isn't, please tell me._

She scanned it twice more, deleted half of the last sentence, and then thought again and retyped it the same way it had been before. Finally, she groaned to herself and quickly hit send before she could think about it any more. 

Five minutes later, she walked into the living room and threw her phone at Gezki, who was sitting on the couch upside down, her long legs crossed over the back. "Don't give that back to me until Radko answers," she said, plopping down on the couch next to her.

"Staring at your phone too hard again?" Gezki took it and tucked it into her pocket, cocking her head as Mona leaned back on the couch and looked at the ceiling. 

"I sent him the text. It's... I'm a little worried he's just going to be pissed at me for trying too hard."

Gezki shrugged. "Maybe he'll actually appreciate it. Maybe he won't. Either way, you're probably never going to see him again, so don't sweat it."

"Yeah, you're right," she admitted, but didn't take her eyes off the ceiling. She had thought about them running out of time as the summer ended, but she hadn't really thought about what 'running out of time' actually meant. She wasn't sure how to feel about it; though Radko was difficult and stubborn most of the time, she'd grown fond of him. She might actually miss being around him. 

After a moment, Gezki told rolled into an upright sitting position in one fluid movement. "Hey nerd, stop thinking so hard. You want to watch a movie?"

"Yes please."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm excited to post the next chapter, you guys. This is where it starts getting good (if I may say so myself!)


	10. In Which Radko is Surprised

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize for the lameness of the chapter titles. Perhaps I should have just stuck with "Chapter #", but I'm in too deep to stop now.

_It's fine. I'll be there._

Mona put her phone back in her pocket for the third time and told herself not to take it out again. The text from Radko was three days old. He had offered no other words, and though she had gone back and forth with herself over saying something else, she eventually decided not to. But now, standing at the meeting place twenty minutes early, watching the crowd with trepidation, she had nothing else to do but check messages from him to see if he was late or lost. 

She mentally berated herself for arriving too early. Early was her thing, but now it left her waiting with a knot of anticipation sitting hard on her stomach. She reminded herself again that this was the last day she needed to worry about contending with Radko; after this, they'd go their separate ways and his opinion of her would never have any effect on her again. Still, she wanted to leave on good terms, to know that she had tried and that she had at least not failed. 

There was only so much comfort in the thought. 

What a summer. 

"Hi."

Mona started as much as she ever did--a tiny jump and a hasty glance towards the voice at her left shoulder. Somehow, Radko had snuck up on her. She suddenly questioned her attention; with her back to a wall, there should have been no way he could slip past her peripheral vision, so she must have gotten lost enough in her thoughts that she failed to register his approach. She glanced him over; he was dressed as she would have expected, in cargo shorts and a vaguely stained t-shirt. His hair was gelled up just as high as the day she'd met him, and the expression on his face was unreadable--or perhaps simply neutral. 

"Hi. I'm surprised you're early."

"You said no later than two. I figured that would be when the train would be leaving. Where are we going?"

"Not telling you yet," she said immediately. "And actually, the train doesn't arrive until 2:20. I was just... giving us plenty of extra time, in case you were late."

He snorted, and cracked a small smile. "I don't know whether to be offended or not, but you're probably right to do that."

They stood in awkward silence for a moment, and then Mona quickly checked the time on the giant clock in the middle of the station and turned to him. "Well, the train won't be here for thirty minutes. Want to find somewhere to sit?"

He looked around without moving his feet, a bemused expression on his face. "I don't see any open benches," he remarked.

"Ah, you're right."

"How'sabout the floor?" He said, and promptly plopped himself down against the wall right next to where he'd been standing. Mona sat down a little more slowly, her long legs making sitting on the floor awkward as always. 

"I'm sorry I pried into your business," Mona said suddenly after nearly a minute of silence had gone by. 

Radko looked at her, flicked an ear, and then looked out at the crowds across the station. "I told you, it's fine."

"I hope you mean that."

He looked a little taken aback for a moment, though he still didn't make eye contact. "Okay, yeah, you pissed me off a little," he said after a moment. "But it's really no big deal. You're making it out to be a major thing, and... I don't really care that much," he admitted quietly. 

"Don't care?"

He let out a soft groan. "Look, you didn't really do anything that wrong. It's not wrong for you to show concern about me, I just... don't want it. But you didn't know that, so..." He shrugged. "I get it. It's whatever." He met her eyes for a moment, and seemed a little exasperated by what he saw there. "All is forgiven," he insisted, and looked away again. 

"Thank you."

For another moment they sat in silence, but Mona felt as though a weight had left her body. Radko seemed relaxed. He was good at feigning it, but Mona realized that she was getting better about realizing when he was really relaxed and when he was just putting it on. 

"So, I'm thinking that I might keep working with Helping Paws," she blurted, and was promptly surprised with herself. She had barely thought the words before they came falling out of her mouth. 

He looked at her and cocked his head. "Are you?"

"This has been fun," she said with a shrug, and then inwardly berated herself. Too casual.

"Yeah, I guess." He let his non-reply hang between them for a moment, and then shifted his feet and added, "It's better than volunteering alone."

"I thought so too," she said quickly. 

He gave a tiny, amused huff.

After another moment, Mona added, "I'd like to keep... working with you. If it's okay with you, anyway."

Radko looked at her, then heaved a sigh and looked back down. "Mona, I..." He folded his paws in his lap, seeming unable to find the words. "Look, I wouldn't mind that, except... I don't like them trying so hard to keep tabs on me. And no matter what, they're going to use what you tell them to do that."

"What if I don't tell them anything?"

"I think they'd know you were hiding things," he said sadly.

She wasn't sure what to say. After a moment, Radko mumbled something about finding a bathroom, and got up and walked away. 

 

 

They didn't say anything more about it for the rest of the wait. After a couple minutes of silence between them, Radko got out his phone and started playing a game on it; tiny little chimes and clicking sounds blended into the background bustle of the station. Mona found herself annoyed at him for a moment, but then reminded herself that she wasn't conversing with him, either. Five minutes later, she was on Furbook on her own phone, mentally blessing the station's wifi. 

When 2:15 rolled around, she mumbled a few words to get Radko on his feet and lead the way towards the edge of the platform. They heard the train in the distance as they walked up, and Radko nudged her towards one end of the platform; "That's where the section for our size will be," he said quietly when she gave him a quizzical look. 

The train ride, they passed in silence. They only had a few stops to go, though Radko didn't know that. Mona didn't stare at a map, or look at a schedule; she'd memorized those yesterday so that she wouldn't give anything away about their stop before they got to it. Her caution worked; Radko looked a little startled when they arrived at the correct stop and she stood up. 

He looked around curiously as they stepped out onto the platform, but she knew that he wouldn't get any clues just yet. "I've only been to this part once," he murmured, almost to himself, and Mona smiled when she knew he wasn't looking. He'd have no idea what was coming. 

She lead the way out of the station; it was a half-mile's walk to where they were going, but it was only arduous for its silence; though she was feeling hopeful for her plan working well, she still couldn't think of anything to say that wouldn't either give it away or make Radko uncomfortable, so she stayed silent. 

 

 

"Hi? I'm Mona, you must be Seth?" Mona held her hoof out to the middle-aged gemsbok, who brightened as soon as he realized who he was talking to. 

"Mona! So nice to meet you. And this must be Radko?"

Radko shook his hand while casting Mona a confused look. Seth beamed at them both, then quickly looked them over and said, "I'll be right back," and hastened off.

"Why does everyone you know already know who I am," Radko whispered, sidling up to her. 

"This one, I called ahead."

"That doesn't make it feel less creepy."

By now, Radko was looking a weird mixture of uncomfortable and intrigued; they'd arrived at the little park and as soon as he'd realized that they were heading for the skating structures, his hackles had gone up. She wasn't sure if it was interest or apprehension; his expression was hard to read, and kept changing in little ways. 

Seth came walking back from his van with his arms full of gear: helmets, knee and elbow pads, and two skateboards. Radko, looking more confused by the minute, looked at him, then at Mona, back at him, and finally turned to Mona and, trying to be quiet but failing, said, "What's going on here?"

"Well, Radko," Seth said, arriving at his left and making him startle, "You two are going to be teaching some kids how to skate."

 

 

Radko put on his gear with a quick, practiced determination. When he got to the helmet, he went over to a nearby water fountain and stuck his head under it until the gel loostened, then squashed his mane flat and strapped the helmet under his jaw. Mona was still struggling with getting a kneepad to sit correctly on her kneecap when he finished, and without speaking or meeting her eyes, he helped her position and strap it into place. She bent her leg experimentally; it wasn't very comfortable, but it wasn't pinching either, and she left it alone. She strapped the other one on the same way, tightening it until they both felt the same. 

The helmet she was provided with didn't quite fit her head; it felt fine until she tried to tighten it down, and then found that the straps pinched her ears uncomfortably. She fussed with them for a minute, but then gave up and resigned herself to ear pain. 

"Ready, you two?" Seth came back over once they were both strapped in securely. "I hope you are, because here they come!" He gestured across the park, to where a van had just pulled up in the parking lot and a group of children of all species were piling out of it. 

"Shit," Radko mumbled, and Seth shot him a look. He immediately backpedaled. "Sorry, I didn't mean that, I'll keep my mouth clean around them," he said hastily, holding up his paws placatingly. "I just uh, didn't get much time to prepare." He shot a glance at Mona and then gave Seth a sheepish smile. Seth returned a warm one and clapped him on the back. 

"I'm sure you'll do fine," he said, and immediately turned to go over to where the group was congregating and donning their own safety gear that an adult mink was untangling from a large, unruly pile. 

Radko turned to Mona. "I don't know much about kids," he said quietly. 

"They haven't changed much since we were young," she said. He gave her a look, and she said, "No, really. All the kids I've worked with in the last few years have reminded me of myself in one way or another, when I think about it. They're just mammals like us, only a little younger."

He snorted as though to say that he thought that was a little crazy, but turned to watch the group anyway, only a little trepidation in his face. 

 

 

"...and here to help demonstrate the techniques we're going to be learning, we have Mona the okapi and Radko the hyena. Everybody say hi to them!"

Mona quickly slapped on a friendly smile as all the children sitting on the grass turned their heads and dutifully said hi to her, and saw Radko next to her doing the same thing with one of his classic, if slightly forced, toothy grins.

"Now, I've been told that Radko here," Seth said, grinning at his subject before turning back to the children, "is a veteran skater, but Mona is a beginner just like you. So, in order to help you all learn a little something before we go home in," he checked his watch, "two hours, we're going to have Radko teach Mona while you watch."

Radko, his expression going from interested to alarmed, whispered, "What," so quietly that Mona barely heard him. Mona just grinned at him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let the shenanigans begin!


	11. In Which Mona Takes Some Spills

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, here we go, I hope it lives up to the hype.

Seth turned the kids loose on the flat sidewalk with boards to learn the basics of balancing with the mink watching them all very closely, and returned to Mona and Radko. Radko was sitting on a low ramp, his knee bouncing, looking a combination of anxious and excited. Mona, next to him, was more focused on not sliding off the ramp. Seth walked up to them both once he was sure that all of the children were occupied. 

"So, what do you two think? Are you ready to teach these young mammals a thing or two?"

Radko raised his eyebrows. "Sounds like I'll be, uh, teaching this young mammal a thing or two?" He quipped, pointing at Mona with his thumb. She tried not to snort at the awkwardness of it. "What exactly are we going to be doing?" he asked Seth, ignoring--or oblivious to--her amusement.

"You're pretty much just going to be demonstrating a few techniques as I describe them--it's all easy stuff, we won't be having them doing any jumps or anything dangerous today. Mona told me that you might be a little rusty, but I trust that everything you'll be doing will be easy."

Radko just nodded. Seth continued. 

"Then, we're going to have Mona try each thing you demonstrate, and you're going to stand by to correct her, help adjust her technique, or whatever else we need. I'll direct you as needed; I'm sure it will all be fine."

"Okay," Radko said, sounding a little less than sure. 

"I've never been on a skateboard in my life," Mona said, "Should I, well, be practicing balance with the kids?"

"If you'd like to, go ahead!" Seth said enthusiastically. He turned to Radko. "And you may certainly grab a board and practice a thing or two, if you want. Try not to do anything too dangerous in front of the kids--we don't want them trying risky stunts just yet."

"Yessir," Radko said, and Seth clapped him on the shoulder, then returned to the group. He had strapped on his own safety gear by now, and he grabbed a board--much bigger than most of the ones that they were using--and started balancing and rolling right next to them. 

"I'm going to go join them," Mona said after a moment of both of them just standing and watching. "I think I'm going to need it."

Radko snorted out a little laugh, and nodded. "Yeah, I'm going to, uh, I'll be here."

"Not going to get on a board just yet?"

He shrugged. "I guess I might as well," he said, but he still didn't move. Mona turned to grab a board and join the kids, and she saw him get up and shuffle towards the board that he had been eyeing once she walked away. 

 

 

"Now, the idea is to build up speed before you get to the ramp. You'll be more stable if you can avoid putting a foot on the ground once you get to the slope," Seth explained to the rapt group of children as Radko rolled almost effortlessly back and forth over the shallowest of the ramps. Each time, he planted both feet firmly on the board just before he left flat ground, rolled quickly up and over the ramp, and then turned himself around to go at it again. Little heads turned to watch him as he went back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. Mona just hoped that they were actually listening as well as watching. 

"Mona, are you ready to try?"

Mona started slightly as he said her name; she got up from where she was sitting off to the side. "I guess so!" she said much more brightly than she felt, her heart suddenly hammering. She felt totally unprepared. Her little bit of back-and-forth rolling with the children earlier had left her feeling only slightly more balanced than before. 

"Go ahead, then, take your time. It's important to take new things slowly," Seth said, turning back to their audience as he spoke. 

Mona, clamping her nerves down almost as tightly as her grip on the board, met Radko's eyes as she moved into position at one end of the flat stretch. His grin dared her to try it, but his eyes were reassuring. She carefully set the board down, making sure that it was pointed in exactly the right direction. She definitely didn't feel confident enough to turn herself around like Radko kept doing. She knew that, in theory, a little lean to the left or right would adjust her direction slightly, but... she didn't want to try to think about that just yet. 

Once again trying not to focus on her nervousness, she planted a foot on the board and pushed off. Her takeoff was a little wobbly and much too slow, and she gave herself a moment to steady before she put her other foot down again, increasing her speed. She was going a little quicker now than she felt comfortable with, but not nearly as quickly as Radko had been; she hoped it would be enough. 

Her course was straight, and she hit the bottom of the ramp with a little bump and a bit of a wobble, but it didn't make her feel too unsteady--until she got about halfway up the ramp and realized very quickly that she was going much too slowly. She panicked for a brief second, wondering how to speed up on the incline, but then all rational thought flew out of her head as the board started to reverse direction and she lost her balance entirely. It shot out from under her and she fell in a graceless heap on the ramp, landing on her hands and her hip. The board went rolling rapidly across the concrete until it hit a curved slope, where it slowed, reversed again, and stopped. 

Mona's hooves stung, and her hip was surely bruised; she painfully pulled herself into a sitting position, and suddenly embarrassment washed over her. She'd just failed an elementary thing in front of a bunch of children. She looked down, fighting to keep tears from her eyes, and then suddenly there were paws in front of her gaze and she looked up to see Radko's face, his expression gentle and concerned. 

"Are you okay?"

"I think so." She willed the tears to go away, and to her relief they started to obey. She heard Seth in the background, telling the children that the most important thing to do when someone fell was to make sure they were okay, but she tuned him out. She started to move, wincing, but Radko reached out and quickly put a paw on her knee to stop her. 

"Give yourself a second, you fell on your hip pretty hard. You sure everything is okay?" He'd lowered his voice a little now, and he was leaning in a little to try to look at her hip where she'd hit. Mona tried hard not to wrinkle her nose at the smell of him up close. 

"I'm fine. I'll have a bruise, and my palms are stinging," she said quietly. "Nothing serious at all."

He offered a small smile. As he looked at her face again, he seemed to realize that her eyes were still a little teary, and he leaned in closer to whisper, "Don't worry about it, I guarantee you every one of these kids are going to eat it much worse than you just did." He winked as he leaned back, and Mona let out the breath she'd held as soon as she realized he was leaning in again. 

"You're right," she said, and he got up and offered his paw to help her up. She took it gratefully; even though her hip was already hurting less, she knew she'd be feeling it for a few minutes yet. 

"Okay, Radko," Seth said, noticing that she was up again. "Explain to Mona, so they can hear, what she needs to do differently."

Radko shot her an apologetic look, then promptly turned to the kids. 

"So Mona, um... maybe you could tell, but she was going too slow when she got to the ramp. When you go up, you always slow down, so you have to have speed before you get to the ramp in order to get over it. She did fine other than that, she just needs to go faster."

"Show us one more time before she tries again," Seth told him, and so he dutifully went and fetched his board. He lined it up where Mona had started, nudging her errant board out of the way first, and then pushed off. He pushed off much harder and stronger than she had, and then gave himself one more quick push before putting both of his feet on the board and rolling steadily up and over the ramp. He stopped near Mona, who was standing on the other side, and raised his paws as though to say, "Tadaa."

"Very good. Mona, you try again."

As she walked over to get her board, she heard Seth telling them that it was important to try again after you fall. She gathered her board up, glanced at Radko once more, and then focused on the task at hand. 

She pushed off harder, wobbling herself a little in the process, but she didn't feel too unsteady, so she quickly gave another push. The ramp was looming and it was hard to judge her own speed against Radko's, so she gave another quick push just in case. She steadied herself just before she got to the ramp. The slight bump at greater speed made her wobble again, but she kept her feet planted and stuck with it. She was already keeping in mind, however, what she hoped would be a better way to bail in case she needed to. 

Mona lost most of her speed as she approached the top of the ramp, and felt herself making fists as she mentally willed the board to go just a little further, and to her relief, it did. She got to the flat place on top of the ramp with barely any speed left, and breathed a sigh of relief as she slowly crossed it and reached the other slope. The moment the front wheels started downward she picked up speed, and let out a tiny squeak as she suddenly found herself at the bottom of the ramp, then beyond--she was going much faster, she was wobbling hard enough that she could only focus on staying on the board--

She slammed suddenly into a wall of fur, Radko's shoulder going right into the bottom of her ribcage and knocking the wind right out of her. Frozen by shock and her lack of air, she was unable to recover as the board went flying out from under her feet, and she flailed for purchase. Her feet hit the ground hard as Radko, arms around her waist, finally succeeded in steadying her, but he was crouched under her, shoulder still braced against her ribs, and she was leaning awkwardly over him. With a loud grunt, he heaved her upright and steadied her as she found her balance again. She stood for a moment in shock, then looked down at him. He had let go as soon as she was steady. He was laughing, but trying to stifle it. She frowned crossly at him in between gasping to get her lungs to refill properly.

He glanced over to make sure that Seth had the kids' attention, and then looked up at her again with an amused grin on his face. "You didn't expect that much acceleration on the other side, did you?"

"I haven't done this before, you know," she said with only a little wheeze, smoothing her shirt flat where he'd grabbed her. 

"Well you had it until you freaked out," he said. He pointed to the board, which had rolled off to the side and stopped at the edge of the grass, not far from Seth and the kids. "You managed to turn right into me--I didn't even realize you were coming until you were right there. I almost sidestepped you, but I realized that you were probably going to eat it on the edge of the railing over there if I did." He pointed to the railing behind them, and Mona pinned her ears, embarrassed, as she realized that he was right. 

"Always keep your eyes forward if you can. Hitting a bump on the ground in front of you won't wreck you nearly as badly as hitting an obstacle you didn't see will."

Mona looked at the railing, and then turned back to look at the board, but avoided his eyes. 

Radko, seeming at a loss for words, stared at her for a moment longer and then started and realized that Seth was calling him. He walked over to the group and started helping Seth get the kids organized on the two available ramps to try going over them. Mona went and fetched her board, and then went and sat down on a bench nearby next to the mink, who greeted her with a toothy smile. 

"You're brave," The mink said after a minute. "I would not have got my nerve back up if I were in your place out there."

"Thank you," Mona said, not quite believing her, but not willing to undermine the compliment. 

"What's got you doing this, anyway? I can tell he loves it, but you don't really seem that eager."

Mona took a deep breath, and then launched into explanation. She told the mink about her schooling, about trying to find an internship, about Radko's stubbornness and his anger when she pushed too hard into his life. After a moment of hesitation she lowered her voice and told her, a little embarrassed, about stalking his Furbook with Gezki and deciding to do this as a way to make it up to him.

When she finished, the mink was holding her face in her paws. "If that isn't the sweetest thing, bless your heart. I hope he appreciates all you're doing for him. It seems like you two have become good friends. It'd be a shame to see that go to waste just because your kind nature rubbed him the wrong way."

Mona blinked. Though she agreed now that she thought about it, she had never really thought of Radko as her friend. It wasn't that she didn't, but she had always been more focused on her obligation to him, to Helping Paws, and to the university. 

"Well," she said at length, "I guess I'll just have to see."

 

 

By the time they got back on the train to go home almost three hours later, Mona felt sore all over. She had fallen twice more, and though she suffered no more than bruising each time, each bruise was a dull ache. Her ears, as she had guessed they would, hurt at the bases from the pinching of the helmet. She tried not to move them too much. 

Radko, however was exuding relaxed and happy. He was sprawled across the bench seat next to her, occasionally tapping his fingers on the back of it, looking out the window but not seeming focused on anything he saw. He didn't seem inclined to talk, but didn't seem uncomfortable with the silence either. 

"I had fun today," she said quietly. 

He came back into focus and looked at her. "Yeah? Really? You seemed a little, uh, I don't know. It didn't really seem like your thing."

She couldn't help but laugh at his awkward, struggling sentence. "I doubt I'll be getting into skateboarding any time soon," she said, offering a smile, "But I like trying new things, and I always like working with kids. I guess I took that first fall harder than I should have, but... you were right. Everybody 'eats it' when they're starting out."

He laughed at her use of his phrase. "It's the damn truth," he said, sitting up a little. 

"Besides, I set this up for you. I thought you'd like to... be able to do something you really like, for once, instead of just bouncing between arbitrary activities." She didn't quite look at him; she let her eyes unfocus on the earrings of a jerboa on the other end of the car.

"Yeah, well. It was weird. I've never taught little kids to skate before." Seeing her expression cloud a little, he added, "I liked it though. You were right."

She smiled, but couldn't really think of anything to say, so they both let their eyes drop away to look at other things. After a few minutes, he said quietly, "Thanks for doing this."

"You're welcome."


	12. In Which Mona Makes Contact

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Perhaps I should have said this last time, but oh well. Some news!
> 
> Now that the first big turning point has passed, I'm gonna slow down my posting speed a little bit. I feel that my work is better if I'm several chapters ahead of what is posted, and it gives me time to go back and edit if I realize that I've created inconsistencies. I'll strive to never let more than two weeks go by without an update (I'm shooting for more like 7-10 days), but what I plan and what takes place ain't ever exactly similar.

"So, how did it go?"

"Geeze, Gez, at least let me get in the front door," Mona sassed, rolling her eyes at Gezki, who had bounced up from her seat at the kitchen table the moment she heard the door open. 

"Oh don't play coy, I know you want to talk about it. Did he like it?"

"Yeah. I think it threw him off... he didn't seem quite sure what to think at first. But he got along with the kids well, and he thanked me for setting it up on the way back."

Gezki gave a happy little skip and offered a high-five. Mona rolled her eyes again, but accepted it, then went around Gezki and into the kitchen. She found tea, as she knew she would, in the kettle. She poured herself a mug and sat down at the table. She sipped it pensively, and a moment later, Gezki joined her. 

"So, how would you rate the whole experience? I know you bitched to me a lot, but it was good and bad, yeah?"

Mona laughed a little. "Best friends are _for_ bitching to, aren't they?" 

"Bitch, I ain't complaining. Tell me how you liked it."

Mona laughed again and then sipped her tea. "Overall, it was... good. He was always stubborn, and he... didn't really want to open up, not that I could really blame him. I'm some stranger who's forced into his life for only a couple of months, and... well, it seems like he's had a few bad experiences with strangers being forced into his life." She sipped again as she mulled her thoughts over, and then added, "And he always _smelled_. Good gods, I don't have anything against predators as mammals, but I never want them near my nose. They all smell different, but they all _smell_."

Gezki was giggling uncontrollably. "I hear you," she squeaked, and clapped her paws over her muzzle as her laughter turned into a snort. A moment later, she collected herself and took them away. "Try working with patients, though. I think the rankest mammal I have ever smelled was a bison."

"A bison."

"A urine- and feces-soaked bison."

"Oh, _gross_." Mona wrinkled her nose in disgust. "Don't tell me about that, now I'm imagining it."

Gezki made a cheeky face, but then folded her paws. "How do you think he felt by the end?"

Mona shrugged. "He seemed like he was having fun, but..."

"But what?"

"I don't feel like I actually made a difference to him."

Gezki made a face but didn't say anything to that, and Mona looked into her mug as she pondered.

"You look like you're thinking too hard."

She took a deep breath and looked up at Gezki. "I was talking to the kids' supervisor while I was there. Just idle chat, but we were discussing Radko a little, and she said something about, uh..." She looked at the ceiling, trying to remember. "I told her a little bit about how I made him mad by pressing too hard, and then trying to set up the last day to be special. She said something about how it seemed like we were good friends, and it would be a shame if he still held it against me after that."

Gezki nodded. "Yeah?" she prompted, sensing that Mona wasn't done with her thought. 

"Yeah, and... well, it made me realize that I guess we did become friends, or at least it seemed like it to me. I hadn't really thought about it before that, I was too focused on my _obligation_ , but... she's right. I don't know how to go about it, but I think it would be nice, to still be friends with him."

Gezki sat there, her expression unchanging for a moment, and then she gave Mona the biggest shit-eating grin. "I knew you had a crush on him," she teased. 

"Oh my-- _no_ , Gez."

"I'm kidding, I'm kidding! No really, I'm kidding." She said, her face falling back into seriousness as Mona levied another glare at her. "You know I can't resist, sweetie. Really though, I'm glad you think he's a decent enough fellow. So what are you going to do, invite him out for drinks with the girls?"

Mona resisted the urge to roll her eyes at the remark. "I'm still thinking about that part," she said quietly.

 

 

Three days later, Mona got an idea. She went outside and sat on the bench outside of Gezki's front door, and forced herself to pick up her phone and call Radko before she could talk herself out of it. 

The phone rang, and rang, and rang. After the first three, she knew that he wasn't going to answer, but she waited anyway, waited until she was transferred to voicemail. His voicemail wasn't set up, so she didn't bother listening to the automated recording instructing her to leave a message after the tone. She took the phone away from her ear and was about to hang up, but then she shook her head and lifted it back up. She waited for the beep, and then suddenly found herself without words. 

"So," she said after a few seconds, more to fill the gap than because she thought it a proper way to begin a message. It suddenly occurred to her that maybe she should have stated her name and business first, but then again, he had said that his phone knew her. 

She suddenly realized that a few more seconds of silence had gone by, and so without any real idea of what she was doing, she started talking.

"So I think that this summer has shown me that I honestly do like volunteering. I've been having a lot of fun, trying different things, and... well, there's also this honor society that I want to get into at the university, and it requires volunteer hours... anyway, I want to keep volunteering, and I would like to, well, continue our... buddy system?"

She stopped talking and bit her tongue. She wasn't really making much sense. She took a deep breath and made herself continue. 

"Anyway, I thought some more about continuing to work with Helping Paws, and I even thought about asking you if you'd like to keep doing what we have been doing, but you already said that you don't like the... being watched thing. So, if it's okay with you, I'd rather just..." She stopped again. Was there a good way to continue that sentence? Maybe it was better to start over. "I would rather volunteer with you. I enjoyed this summer, but I think it would be nice to be able to just... hang out as equals. I think that maybe, we'd have a better time getting along if I wasn't... the embodiment of the state watching you," She said, trying for humor, but she didn't feel like it had worked as well as she'd hoped. Oh well. Press on. "Anyway, give me a call back when you have a chance, and let me know what you think. Bye."

She quickly hung up, dropped her phone into her lap, and fixed her eyes on the view of the rainforest in front of her. Now she just had to wait.

 

 

To Mona's surprise, she didn't have to wait very long. Her phone buzzed only about twenty minutes later, and she grabbed at it, then frowned in disappointment when it was just a text, not a call. Her expression softened as she read it:

_I'm no good at phone calls. Can we meet up and talk instead?_

_Of course. Maybe the Jackal and Lynx again, for old time's sake?_

She wondered if 'for old time's sake' was really appropriate to use in this situation until he responded again. _Sorry, I don't have any money right now._

_I'll pay._

_I can't ask you to do that._

_I'm offering, you aren't asking._

He took a little longer to reply, but when he did, it was just a simple _Ok_.

She texted him a time the following day, and he confirmed. She took a deep breath, and hoped for the best. 

 

 

Mona, as was her custom, arrived five minutes early. Radko was nowhere to be seen, but she wasn't surprised. She took a seat, not bothering to order anything yet, and browsed Furbook on her phone to keep her mind busy while she waited. 

"Hi."

Mona jumped. Her Furbook distraction had worked so well that she hadn't even noticed Radko approach. She quickly locked her phone and set it down, embarrassed. "Hello," she said, offering a warm smile. "How are you?"

"I'm good," he said, sitting down across from her. He looked anything but. His fur looked like he'd just rolled out of bed, his eyes looked exhausted, and he was wearing the same clothes that he had been when they'd gone skating--and they did not look like they'd been washed. 

"Really?" She hesitated to ask, but she figured that she should be candid with him. She no longer had anything to prove.

He blinked at her, then huffed out a small laugh. "Actually, fuck it. No. I'm not doing so great." He was smiling as he said it, in spite of the roughness he was clearly feeling. "But that's not important right now."

Mona gave him a moment to elaborate, but he didn't, so she prompted, "What exactly did you want to say?"

"Well, uh..." He scratched his neck awkwardly. "So, I listened to your voicemail a bunch and I was thinking about what to say in response, so, uh, if I sound like I'm following a script, I... kind of am. Anyway." He cleared his throat awkwardly, then folded his paws on the table and leaned forward slightly, his gaze locked on Mona's face in a way that unsettled her a little. "So, yeah, I've kinda been having fun this summer too, and I still have more community service to finish, so... I think it'd be nice to keep going together. But. Um." He paused to take a deep breath, then tapped his fingers twice and kept talking. "You're right that I don't really like Helping Paws watching me, so I'd rather just, you know, hang out, but not through them. So as long as you're cool with that, then I'd say yeah, great."

"That's perfectly fine with me."

"Awesome. Okay. Oh, one more thing. I might have to introduce you to my parole officer? The only reason I was able to just volunteer anywhere with you this summer is because I had documentation through Helping Paws that that's what we were doing, so she accepted it instead of getting assigned work through the community center. She might still accept it if I show her that I'm still working with you and still doing the same thing? I don't know. I think it would be worth a shot."

"I'm fine with that too."

Radko finally looked down. "Well then, uh, friendship contract settled and all..." he shot Mona a brief mischievous look. 

She laughed. "Indeed. Shall we eat lunch, then?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one sure did have a lot of italics. When is AO3 gonna support pasting in formatting so I don't have to go through and html-italicize every time? Sheesh.


	13. In Which Mona Is Concerned

Somewhere between filling her backpack with all the textbooks and supplies she would need for the coming semester and packing her things to move back into the dorms, Mona forgot to text Radko. In fact, it was not until the evening of the third day of classes that he even crossed her mind. Her phone buzzed while she was doing homework on her laptop, and she checked it curiously, only to groan to herself when she saw:

_So did college like eat you?_

She saved her homework just in case this distraction lasted longer than a moment and quickly tapped out a response.  _Yes! College campuses are the number one modern predator of okapis, you know._

She smiled at her own joke, and then decided to respond more sincerely, and quickly sent another message.  _In all honesty, I did forget to contact you. Moving back to the dorms took more of my attention and time than I expected it to._

She set her phone back down and returned to the homework, but only got a little further when her phone buzzed again. 

_Lol. Yeah I know what it's like to move a lot_

She was about to respond when another arrived: _When can you meet my parole officer?_

Mona took ten minutes to respond because she pulled up her schedule on the computer, and then cross-referenced it against the train, tram, and bus routes that were nearby. She finally came up with three times during the week in which she felt that she felt she could reasonably make it to Savannah Central during normal diurnal business hours. She sent those through and went back to her homework, not expecting to hear a response until he had a time to tell her. But to her surprise, her phone buzzed again only a moment after she set it down. 

 _Thanks. Will get back to you tomorrow on that._ And then another moment later:  _What's living in the dorms like?_

Mona gave up entirely on her homework, saving it and closing the laptop, and sat back in her chair to type. At first, she wasn't sure what to say, but soon she had a whole paragraph typed in. 

_I like it. It's great to be right on campus, so I can always walk down to the library or to anywhere else on campus if I need to. I miss having a kitchen, though, because even though the dining halls are pretty decent, I do like cooking sometimes. It's certainly louder than Gezki's place, with thinner walls and all that, but my neighbors this semester aren't too bad so far. My roommate this semester seems cool. She's a fossa named Lilac, and she was supposed to be living in a different dorm, one for smaller mammals, but she says they ran out of space, so everyone here is bigger than her. She doesn't seem to mind, though. I miss Gezki already, but at the same time I'm happy to be back. Last semester was all introductory courses, but this semester it's going to start getting more interesting. Plus, there's a certain camaraderie between students. We all complain about homework and professors together._

"Are you writing a book over there?"

Mona twitched--it wasn't a big enough movement to be a jump--and looked up from her phone. Her roommate's round face was peering down from the top bunk, completely upside down. She blinked, glanced back at her phone, and then looked up again. "No," she said, bemused but trying not to show it too much, "I'm just texting a friend."

"Would you mind turning the typing sounds off? It's a little hard to focus on this boring reading with the tick-tick-tick..."

"Oh, of course! Sorry," Mona said quickly. She turned back to her phone, stared at it for a second, and then looked back up sheepishly. "I'm... I don't actually know how to do that," she admitted. 

Lilac laughed and rolled over so she was lying on her stomach instead. "Toss it here, I have you covered."

Mona almost obeyed, but then stopped herself. "I wouldn't want you to drop it."

"Well I'm a great catch, so if you can throw at all, it'll be fine."

Mona was still apprehensive, but she decided that showing trust would be worth the risk to her phone. She tossed it neatly, and Lilac's dextrous brown paws snatched it nearly out of the air. She tapped the screen lightly, swiped experimentally, and then tapped it a couple more times with a frown on her face. Finally, she looked up at Mona. "What's up with your screen? It doesn't like my pawpads."

"Oh, you have to press a little harder. Maybe use your claws instead."

Her face immediately lit up. "Oh! Duh! I should have known that. Sorry, I've only ever used phones for pawpads," she said, waving her paw sheepishly. Using her claws, she quickly began tapping with precision. "Radko, huh? I've never heard that name. What is he, if you don't mind me asking?"

"He's a hyena," Mona said, silently hoping that her roommate wasn't snooping too hard on their conversation. 

"Oh, cool. I'm not sure I've ever really talked to a hyena. Do they really... ah, shit."

"What?"

Lilac bit her bottom lip, looking embarrassed, but then said more quietly, "My parents are always spouting stereotypes, and uh, I only recently realized just how bad I've picked up the habit, so I'm... trying to break myself of it."

Mona smiled. "That's a good goal," she said, trying to sound encouraging without being patronising. "What were you going to ask?"

Her face showed embarrassment again, but she said softly, "I was going to ask if hyenas really laugh as loudly as... well, the actors in comedies I guess?" She handed the phone back, and Mona set it on her desk. 

Mona couldn't help but chuckle. "I know what you mean. And, well... I've only heard him really laugh a few times, and I guess it is kinda loud. Not quite like in the movies, though."

"I kinda thought so."

Just as she was trying to think of something else to say, Mona's buzzing phone distracted her.

_What is a fossa?_

When she glanced up again, Lilac was once again lying on her back with all four paws in the air, supporting her textbook with an expression of utter boredom on her face. Mona cautiously sneaked a picture of her, then stood up and held her phone up near the textbook so she could see it without having to move. Lilac snorted. "Is  _that_  what I look like right now?"

"Yeah. Radko asked what a fossa was, mind if I send him this?"

Lilac snorted again. "Sure, why not."

Mona sat back down, sent the picture, and then set her phone down and returned to her laptop, determined to get back to her homework. 

 

 

Two months later, just days after midterms, as Mona was still relishing her relative freedom from studying, Radko sent her a text that took her mind off all else.

_You wouldn't turn me in to the cops, would you?_

Mona frowned, her heart giving a tiny jump of alarm as the message and its meaning sunk in. She stared at her phone, then locked it and set it down on her desk. A few jittery, confused, nervous thoughts flickered through her head, amounting to,  _'Wait, what?'_

After taking a moment to collect her thoughts, she picked her phone back up. Instead of answering properly, Mona finally texted back,  _That question has me very concerned. Are you okay?_

The reply was almost immediate.  _Yes, I'm okay._

She heaved a sigh and relaxed a little.  _What's going on?_

She waited for a few minutes, but finally set her phone down when she still didn't see a reply. She tried to go back to the chapter she'd been reading in her textbook, but it wasn't interesting enough to keep her attention away from the little worries flickering through her mind. She finally gave up, put a folded piece of paper in the book as a bookmark, and played a game on Furbook while she waited for his response, hoping that he wouldn't keep her waiting for too long. 

Her hopes were answered, though his reply was not as quick as she would have liked. Twenty minutes later her phone buzzed, and she snatched it up too quickly and dropped it on the floor. Groaning softly to herself, she scrabbled under the desk until she found it, then unlocked it and read the message. 

_I'm in a bit of trouble. Nothing immediately dangerous. Probably not eventually dangerous, either, but it's become a problem. Nothing serious, but it ain't exactly legal either. You're very rational, so I wanted to ask your advice. But you're also straight-laced, so I'm a little nervous to say anything._

The nervous pattering of her heart was back. Just like that, it finally hit her that he was, after all, on some kind of probation. There was a  _reason_  he had been in trouble, and she was hesitant to even hear about it. But at the same time... what kind of friend would she be if she refused to let him talk to her?

Biting her lip in apprehension, she responded,  _You can trust me, I wouldn't betray you like that._

His response was quick.  _Good. I don't really want to talk about it over text. Are you busy? Can we meet somewhere?_

 _Now?_ She glanced out the dorm window; though she couldn't see the sky through all the leaves, the light outside was starting to turn orange and dim.

_If possible._

She considered her reading, but then rolled her eyes at herself. She knew she wouldn't be able to concentrate on it until her curiosity was satisfied.  _Sure. Where do you want to meet? Maybe the Jackal and Lynx again?_ Though it wasn't exactly near home and she wasn't a predator, she had taken a bit of a liking to the quaint little cafe, and she had recently looked up the hours; it was open late. 

_... Actually, I'm already on your campus._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really contemplated splitting this in two, since these two sections don't have much to do with each other, but they're both quite short, and I couldn't resist cliffhangering you guys a little bit ;)


	14. In Which They Discuss Radko's Troubles

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **I would very much appreciate if you'd read this whole note, even though it is long**
> 
>  
> 
> So, in the next few chapters, we're gonna enter Radko's "transitioning out of homelessness" phase. But because this is a story for fun about these two characters' relationship, I am not gonna get into nitty-grittiness about the struggles he has to go through. I have never been homeless and I realize that I probably don't know about all the problems he's facing or the things he has to overcome in order to change his life. A lot of that, I have thought about at least a little, but didn't choose to write in. Because of this, it may seem like I've made his obstacles too easy to overcome or handwaved some of it. Maybe I have. I'm unlikely to change much, if anything, after it's posted. That being said, if anyone has suggestions on how to handle something better, I will at least listen to them.
> 
> What I really want to say is that I realize that I'm probably not doing the struggle that is homelessness justice, and it's not really my intention to do it justice. I am writing this as a fun character project, not as a well-developed story by itself. Because I'm glossing over a lot of things that don't have to do with both of them at once, this probably won't be the first time I gloss over relatively important stuff. I don't mean to devalue any other parts of their lives; it's just not the focus of this work. 
> 
> Also, I probably should have said this a while ago, but you guys are absolutely, 100% welcome to ask any questions you might have. I know that I am skipping ahead in scenes sometimes and that there will probably be a lot of little details that never get explained. There's also a lot that I've thought about but that never gets shown. I will try to avoid giving away spoilers, but if there's anything you want to understand better, especially about what's already been posted, please do ask! I'd love to answer your questions. 
> 
> As always, thank you all so much for reading, for your kudos, and especially for your comments. I appreciate them all very much!

Mona found him already on the bench at the bus stop that she had directed him to; it wasn't a very trafficked spot, especially at this time of night, but it was nonetheless lit, and a small canopy protected him from the incessant dripping. 

"Hi," he said, a little awkward, as she sat down on the bench; not quite beside him, but not all the way on the other end, either. 

"Hi," she said automatically, immediately followed by, "Are you sure you're okay?"

He waved her off. "I'm fine, really." He looked like he might elaborate, but then he looked around with an uncomfortable expression. "This, uh, doesn't seem very private."

"The last bus passes in ten minutes," she said with a shrug, "but if you want to go somewhere else, or take a walk, that's okay with me." 

He thought briefly, then shook his head. "Nah, I've been on my paws all day." He slouched down quite low on the bench, but he looked more like he was trying to hide than trying to get comfortable. 

Mona waited. He was still glancing around warily; after a few seconds, he sat up and twisted around to make sure that there was no one behind him, then scooted a few inches closer, hunched slightly over.

"So," he began, but then busied himself scratching his ear and didn't seem to be sure how to continue. 

"What's going on?" she prompted.

He sighed and closed his eyes, then started talking quickly and quietly as though trying to get his words out before he was unable. "So I have this friend, and he's been... helping me out. A lot. And I help him out, too--he finds me little jobs here and there, sometimes pays me, sometimes just gets me what I need at the time. We've known each other for years, y'see, and we've always had each others' backs." He paused for a moment, opened his eyes, and looked at Mona. Something in his expression made her think that he was confirming that she was still there. 

"Little jobs?" she prompted. 

"Yeah, nothing... nothing too bad. Nothing that I could get in real trouble over, nothing I can't claim plausible deniability about if the cops ever got wind of it. Mostly it's running messages to and from his contacts or speaking to someone for him when he doesn't want them to know his face. Once or twice, I've been the thug--some muscle and sharp teeth to intimidate someone who might try to start shit. He knows better than to ever have me running goods back and forth, and he's real good about making sure I have covers in place in case someone gets suspicious. He knows that if I get pinched, he'll lose me and risk exposing himself."

Mona twitched as a slight tremble went up her spine. She knew nothing of crime that couldn't be learned from a textbook or the newspaper, and she had never thought much about it, especially not the kind of petty, accomplice work that Radko was talking about. The implications of what he was facing were there, stark and in her face. She knew, logically, that he was talking about sounded pretty mild, but she was suddenly grasping, for the first time, just how dangerous petty crime could be. He was already under watch, and one false move could take his life away--jail was the most likely, but she found herself wondering if there was some chance of him ending up on the wrong end of some nasty business and turning into another anonymous heap of dead fur to be hauled off in the morning by some uncaring policemammal. 

Oblivious to her thoughts because of his obvious unwillingness to look her in the eye, he kept talking. "So, that's how it's been for the last year or so. He keeps me up, and I do what he asks. I try to know as few details as possible, and he's respected that. But lately..." he sucked in a breath between his teeth in a hiss of air. "Not a month ago, his best runner got pinched. Nothing traceable to him as far as we know--she ditched the evidence real good. But he hasn't been able to deliver goods nearly as well without her, and he's been trying to get me to step up in her place."

"Doing what, exactly?"

"Just doing pickups and drops. Bringing goods to him and delivering them where he needs them to go. I probably won't even be talking to any of his actual customers--"

"Radko, what  _goods?_ "

He huffed out a short, strained laugh. "Like I said, I try not to know more details than strictly necessary. Still, I know that it's mostly drugs. He'll move just about anything--he's a coordinator and a middle man, doesn't get his hooves too dirty with either end of the whole thing."

Mona was silent. Her thoughts were churning and she wanted to blurt some of them, but he hadn't yet asked a question, and she didn't want to risk alienating him by passing judgements on some aspect of his business that he didn't even want her opinion of. She watched him shove the leaf litter across the concrete at the edge of the bus shelter with one paw and let him gather her thoughts as she tried to quiet her own and be patient.

"So, I guess... Do you think I should do it?"

Mona exhaled, and then stifled a chuckle badly. He looked at her, his ears cocked at different angles, and she quickly said, "Well, I feel like you know that my immediate answer will be no, but... I'm trying to see this properly from your point of view."

He snorted. "Yeah, well... I'm glad."

Mona gathered her thoughts; he waited as patiently as she could expect of him, gaze trained on her face and ears tense, but sitting as relaxed as he was able, his attitude all expectation without pressure. She didn't look at him as she thought, but she didn't need to; she could see him almost as well by looking a few feet to one side as she could looking straight at him. 

"So, just to make sure that I understand: this guy is your friend and you have been relying on him, but now he's asking you to do something that... is more risky. What would happen if you say no?"

"I... I have been saying no, but... he's been getting more insistent, and every time I turn down a job, he gives me this  _look_ , and... he hasn't been giving me my usual work as much. At this point, I can tell that he's going to eventually cut me off."

"And you rely on him... how much? Is it just for extra cash, or... survival?"

His eyes locked on her face for a second, but then he looked away so far that he turned his face almost completely away from her. "Survival."

Mona took a deep, deep breath and let it out as a bracing sort of sigh. Radko looked like he might be about to say something, but she spoke again before he could. 

"Okay. It sounds to me like you need a plan."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have an early chapter! I wanted to write down the beginning notes message before I forgot about it, and this one is fairly short anyway. Like I said up there, if you have any questions or comments about this chapter or any other that's come before it, please feel free to speak up down below!


	15. In Which Radko Eats A Lot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoops, it's been a little while, hasn't it?

Mona didn't let him argue. She brought him to the one twenty-four hour diner that she knew was in walking distance. She was glad to see that there were other college students there, one group of which was making quite a racket; the perfect noise cover to have a personal conversation in public without being overheard. She lead the way in and sat in a booth in a corner. Radko followed her in meekly enough, but hesitated to sit, standing awkwardly next to the booth. She gave him a look, her eyebrows raised, and he finally slid in across from her, shoulders hunched. She passed him a menu from the stack of paper ones in their little holder on the table, and when he opened his mouth to protest, she said, "You look like you need a good meal and and some peace of mind, so order whatever you want. I could hear your stomach growling while we were talking at the bus stop. You'll think better without your stomach distracting you. How long has it been since you've eaten?"

He groaned softly and fixed his eyes on the menu. "Okay, this is probably going to sound bad to you..." He glanced up and met her eyes, and grimaced when he saw the concerned frown on her face. "It's been about four days," he said in barely more than a whisper.

Mona sat back abruptly, pinning her ears. "Four days?!"

"Shh," he pinned his own ears, his shoulders hunching even further. "It's not--"

"That's a dangerous amount of time, Radko," she hissed, and opened her mouth to say something else, but he abruptly put a paw on the table as though he'd intended to reach for her but stopped halfway. She paused, alarmed, as he turned to look at the waiter approaching them--a rabbit who, because of his small size and her focus on the conversation, she had not noticed at all until Radko stopped her talking. 

Her ears heating at the thought of accidentally giving away his personal business--of what could be overheard by those big rabbit ears--she offered a pasted-on smile and just asked for water when he asked what they would like to drink. Radko asked for both water and coffee, and the waiter bustled off. 

"You need to be eating," she whispered, softly enough that his still-unsettled-looking ears promptly swiveled towards her to hear better. "I'm surprised you're on your feet after--"

"I'm not prey, Mona." 

The statement stopped her in her tracks. "What do you mean?"

"Four days might be dangerous to you, but to any medium to large predator, it's... really not that long."

She blinked. Blinked again. "Predator metabolism," she said quietly to herself, embarrassment heating her ears and her face. 

"Yeah. Once a day or every other day is healthy, but we're built to be able to go for days without eating and still be fine. So no, I'm not eating as often as I should, but... I'm not in any danger, either."

Mona let out a breath that she didn't realize she'd been holding. "Sorry," she said quietly, "I just worry about you sometimes."

To her surprise, that brought a smile to his face. "Yeah, well, you're probably right to," he mumbled.

The waiter brought them their drinks, and Radko added so much creamer to his coffee that it spilled onto the table. He slurped it cautiously, wincing and sticking his tongue out when he promptly burned it. 

"Well, order whatever you want," she repeated. "If this is going to be your only meal for a few  _more_  days, you might as well eat your fill."

He raised his eyebrows at her, one ear cocked. "Sweetheart, I don't think you realize how much I can  _eat_."

She squinted at him for his choice of words, but decided not to say anything about it. "Seriously, this place is cheap. Get whatever you want."

The look on his face was pure gratitude for a moment, but then he quickly returned to reading the menu. Mona pulled out her reading glasses and looked at another one. She noticed him glance at her curiously when she put them on, but he returned to his menu without comment. 

It was only another moment before their waiter came back, and Mona hastily ordered a side salad by itself and put her menu back where she'd gotten it. Radko took a deep breath, looked at her nervously, and then began listing off his order, his eyes flicking back and forth on the menu to each item as he read it off. Four entrees later--most of which came with various sides--he stopped and looked up at the rabbit, whose face was carefully blank, his reaction to the unusually large order betrayed only by a quickly twitching nose. 

"And your sides with that, sir?"

Radko set the menu aside. "Give me whatever's handy, but nothing too vegetabley, please." 

The waiter assured them that he would have their food out soon, and retreated to the kitchen with his notepad full of scribbles and nose still twitching. Radko watched him go with amusement, then sheepishly looked at Mona.

"Was that too much?"

"A little more than I was expecting, but it's fine. You're sure you can eat all that?"

He sat back with a cocky, toothy grin. "You just wait and watch a master at work."

She rolled her eyes but didn't try to stop a little laugh, and he sat forward again and leaned his elbows comfortably on the table. "So, are you going to enforce that not talking until I've eaten thing, or are you ready to tell me what you think?"

Mona contemplated that question. She knew that she had more questions to ask--she was listing them out in her mind so she wouldn't forget any--but she didn't think that she was comfortable with him answering until he was a little more relaxed. Though he seemed at ease, she could still see tension in his shoulders and the set of his ears, and his stomach's gurgling had grown louder when they had entered the diner with its food-scented air. She shook her head. "I'd rather you ate at least a little, first."

He snorted. "Well, careful how you time your questions. You don't want to see me try to talk with my mouth full."

She didn't try to stop the grimace that statement brought, and he laughed at her face. "I  _have_  seen you talk with your mouth full," she reminded, "and it was no pretty sight."

"Ah, right," he said, tapping one claw on the table. "You do seem to like... feeding me," he said a little awkwardly, and one of his ears flicked curiously. "I don't want to complain, but I hope you realize that I can't exactly pay you back."

Mona shrugged. "I do realize that. And I don't mind, really. Food isn't expensive enough for it to matter, and it seems like my only real way to help you out."

His expression darkened a little, and he frowned at the table between them. Sensing that she'd somehow touched a nerve, Mona didn't try to say anything else, giving him a chance to speak his mind if he wanted. 

"Level with me, here," he said suddenly, his voice quiet again. "I know... I know that we would never have met if you--if I wasn't... an opportunity for you to try to help someone. I think I'm starting to get it. That's one of your  _things_. It's something you  _need to do_ , for some reason. And... I guess I appreciate the help, but... would you even care if I wasn't someone to inflict your assistance on, to make yourself feel good about your life?"

Mona blinked, startled. It had crossed her mind once or twice that he might think that was the case, but not recently. Not since summer had ended. 

"Of course!" she blurted immediately, and he gave her a skeptical look. "Well," she said, trying to find words to elaborate.

"Uh-huh," he said, in a tone that clearly meant,  _figures_. 

"No, really," she said quickly. "Look, what I mean to say is... you're right that we wouldn't have met if I wasn't just this combination of stubborn and insistent on trying to help. That is the only reason we became friends. But now that we are, I'm not just going to lose interest the minute you stop needing--" she stopped herself. Poor choice of words. "I'm not going to lose interest when your life gets better," she amended. 

That seemed to reassure him; he perked up a little, but after only a second his eyes left hers and he sipped his coffee. "And what if it doesn't?"

She tilted her head, a question on her face, not sure what he meant. 

"What if I'm always like this? What if all your help doesn't end up doing me any good, and I stick with my old habits and wind up in jail some day? What then?"

Mona frowned. His tone was combative, his attack sudden and unprovoked, and she had no idea what to say or how to calm him. 

After a moment of stunned silence, she decided to be brutally honest. 

She began slowly and quietly, measuring her words and their pace and refusing to break eye contact with him. "I'm not going to promise that I will never ditch you," she said, and felt a tiny, guilty twinge of satisfaction when she saw on his face that she had gotten right to the heart of the insecurity that had prompted him to start accusing her. "I am not going to promise something when I can't  _know_  that I will keep it." He frowned, but didn't try to interrupt, and she kept going. "I'm still young. You're still young. Mammals change, and we're only just beginning our lives. Maybe one or both of us will leave Zootopia; maybe we'll just grow apart and lose contact. That's just life, and because I can't possibly correctly predict what  _my_  life will be like a few years from now, much less  _yours_ , I'm not going to make a promise that I might one day break." 

His expression cleared a little when he seemed to grasp what she was saying, and he sat up just slightly straighter, but she kept going before he could think to interrupt. 

"That being said, I don't have any intention of... quitting your company." He gave a tiny, amused snort at her choice of words, but didn't try to speak yet. "I do like hanging out with you, and I would like to be able to help you when and where I can. But... I know better than to expect anything to go as either of us has planned. Life is too messy and unpredictable to be expecting anything to work a certain way."

He sat back and put his paws behind his head, stretching, then gave her a sheepish smile. "You're right. I shouldn't... you're right to not want to make promises like that."

She smiled in return, and then he turned his attention back to his coffee, which was apparently now cool enough to drink; he slurped it quietly, and Mona pulled out her phone to check the buzzing that she had heard a minute before. They passed the rest of their time waiting for their food in companionable silence.

 

 

Halfway through his second plate, Mona finished her salad and set the plate aside. Radko barely acknowledged the motion, but when she folded her hooves and said, "So," he froze. 

"Yeah?"

"So you... explained the situation. A little, anyway. But now--what do you want to do?"

He cocked his head. "I told you, I don't know. That's why I asked you what you think."

"No, I mean..." she looked down as she formulated her question. "If there were no obstacles and you could resolve this situation perfectly, what would be your ideal outcome?"

He pondered for a moment, then sighed. "I don't think there's any possible way this could work, but I guess I'll humor the question anyway. I would like to not be reliant on... well, Jones. That's what they all call him. I kinda doubt it's his real name, though." He shook his head. "Anyway, I'd like to keep his friendship, but duck out of his business altogether. It's been a way to live, and I'm very grateful to him for helping me out, but I know it's dangerous. I feel the risk every time I hit the streets for him." He was just poking at his plate with the fork, his eating on pause so he could talk, and Mona was grateful for that. Even his regular chewing was a little gross, and she didn't want to try to listen to him while he ate.

"He's... he's a real all-or-nothing kind of guy, he insists on loyalty and he doesn't tolerate his people... well, getting involved in any other business. They take risks on his terms or not at all. But... I do think that he'll let me go without a fuss. He would probably just tell me not to show my face again, but... I've known him for a while, and I'm not afraid that he'd hurt me for trying to cut ties." He let out a soft puff of breath, a little too subtle to be a sigh. "I just... besides relying on him for help, it would be hard to just turn around and walk away. I've known this guy for years, and he's always been nice to me." 

Mona gave him a moment to see if he was going to go on, and then said quietly, "So you think you'll have to choose between being friends with him and not doing his work?"

"Yes."

They pondered in silence for a moment, and Radko went back to eating. He was halfway through his third plate--Mona checked her phone and resisted the urge to sigh when she saw that it was already after midnight--when the loud group of college students got up and left. With them out the door, the diner fell into a sombre sort of quiet that made her hesitant to talk, because without their noise to cover it up, it would be hard to speak quietly enough to keep it out of the ears of the other mammals in the room.

"If you had to make that choice," His ears immediately swiveled towards her because of the softness of her tone, "which would you choose?"

He hastily swallowed his bite and slurped down a little bit of water to chase it, his coffee long gone. "What choice?"

"The choice between Jones and... safety?"

"Oh." He lowered his voice to match hers and leaned forward a little. "I..." he looked down. "I think I... I know I need to get out before it gets me. I got... I got pinched once before. I can't risk getting caught again. If I do, they  _will_  put me away."

He looked back up at her, but then sighed, moved his plate over a little, and folded his paws where it had just been in front of him. "That's the problem, though," he whispered urgently. "I am stuck. I don't have a real job, or a home. I'm on the streets as it is, though he finds me a couch to sleep on most of the time."

Mona blinked and tilted her head. "You're homeless?" He hissed air between her teeth and she lowered her voice again. "But Helping Paws had your address on file..."

"Yeah, it's a good thing they've never bothered to look into--" He stopped abruptly as she reached across the table and grabbed his paws. He looked alarmed, and she immediately withdrew her hoof and turned to look at their waiter, walking briskly towards them with another rabbit--no, he was bigger and leggier, so a hare--behind him. "We'll go ahead and take your empty dishes," the rabbit said as the hare unfolded the stool he was carrying and set it next to the table. He removed the plates that Radko had cleaned, passing two of them to the rabbit, who stood beside him on the floor. He grabbed Mona's plate as well and, clutching them in one arm, climbed down from the stool, deftly folded it again, and carried it off in his other handpaw. Mona and Radko watched the whole operation with open curiosity. Mona didn't often interact with mammals as small as rabbits, and she was abruptly glad that she was just the size she was, and not bigger or smaller. 

When they were alone again, she looked at Radko. "Sorry, what were you saying?"

He frowned at the table, then suddenly said "Ah! Yeah. Um, I was saying that it's good that Helping Paws never looked into my address. If someone had even Zoogled it, they would have known, but..."

"Did you list a public place?"

He snorted out a little laugh. "No. I listed a friend's apartment. Only, that friend is a rat. He lives in one of those mini-rodentias."

Mona blinked, confused. "What are those?"

"It's a building that's not much bigger than a middle-class house for someone our size, but it holds a few dozen rodent-sized apartments. A lot of them even have a couple stores, and maybe a restaurant or two on the ground floor. From what I've heard, they're great for rodents who work outside of Little Rodentia. I've never been inside, of course. But I use it when I need an address that I can actually get mail at, and it's worked so far."

Mona gave her ears a tiny shake, suddenly remembering the more important thing that had gotten them on this topic in the first place. "I had no idea you were homeless," she whispered, making a sympathetic face at him.

He snorted. "What, wearing dirty clothes all the time didn't tip you off? Hell, after a while last summer I stopped trying to make myself look presentable for you. I knew it was a risk, but I was in a bad place, and I couldn't get myself to care enough to bother looking presentable. I figured that you either knew and thought Helping Paws did too, or realized that it would do me more harm than good if you said anything about it. I didn't think you were that oblivious."

She pinned her ears at him, but with no real annoyance. "I didn't... I don't know much about homelessness," she admitted. "I haven't known anyone who was homeless before. My classes talk about it, from a sociological point of view, but I have never had anyone tell me... about signs."

He looked at her a little incredulously, then looked away. "Damn, our lives have been  _different."_  He chuckled, then grabbed the plate he'd been halfway through and resumed eating. Mona noticed that he had slowed down a bit, but he was still shoving bites into his mouth with no sign of discomfort. 

While she waited for him to finish eating, Mona took out her phone, opened up a text file, and started typing. They didn't say anything else to each other until Radko finished eating and they left the diner. 


	16. In Which Radko Finally Showers

"So, where are we going?"

Mona shrugged. "Nowhere, really. The diner was a little too quiet for privacy, and all the buildings with lounges on campus are closed. Lilac is in our dorm, so I can't bring you there. So I guess our option for talking is to take a walk."

"Okay," he said amicably enough. 

Mona took that as enough of an encouragement that she pulled out her phone. "I was writing down my thoughts while we were sitting in there..."

"And here I thought you were texting a hot date," he quipped. 

"Ha ha. I didn't want to forget anything important." She pulled up her list of notes, slowing her steps a little, but then lowered her phone for a moment and looked at him. "It's hard for me to focus on the bright screen and still look around... so please stop me if I'm about to run into something?"

He laughed but agreed, and she began reading over her notes again. 

"So, you need to get out of that situation, but because you rely on Jones and his people, we need to find you an out. You need a job and a place to stay, right?"

"It isn't as simple as you just made it sound."

"I know, but I can't talk about everything that entails if I still want to get any sleep tonight. So, we need to find you someplace that will employ you even without having a good work history, and somewhere to stay. Those are the two biggest things; we can work out the rest when we get that hammered out."

"There isn't much legitimate work out there for someone like me."

"I know that." She sighed. Judging by his tone and the look he gave her, she doubted that she knew just what it was like, but she pressed on. "But there has to be  _something._  Zootopia is the world leader in public assistance programs, so I know that there's something out there that we can find. It may take some digging, but I'm going to help you with that."

"Okay." He looked a little confused, but he nodded along gamely anyway. "I have no idea where to even start looking. All the programs that have helped me in past have been set up for me by someone else who was responsible for me."

"That's why I said we. I'm going to help you find what you need."

He looked hesitant. "Okay," he said quietly. He reached over and suddenly grabbed her arm and pulled her two feet to the left, moving with her so that they stayed the same distance apart. Mona glanced up just in time to watch a street sign's post go by, which she had been close to colliding with. She thanked him with a nod, and they kept walking. She checked over her phone notes; there were a few more things that she hadn't brought up, but after a moment she decided to save them for another time. She was starting to get tired, and she didn't want to overwhelm Radko or risk irritating him by not knowing all that she could about his situation. At the next intersection, she gently steered them into a right turn, already mentally plotting the route to get back to the part of the campus where her dorm was. 

"Are you busy tomorrow?"

He tilted his head in thought, then shook it. "Nothing going on with me."

She opened her mouth to continue, but then stopped and looked at him. As usual, his clothing was unkempt and he stank. She blinked to herself when she realized that she hadn't noticed his smell until she thought about it; somehow, she'd gotten almost used to his predatory reek. She had been about to suggest that they meet in the campus library, but then rethought it when she realized that he might draw too much attention, looking too little like the college crowd as he did. 

"Okay, can you come back to the Rainforest District and meet me... say, in a coffee shop or something? I'll bring my laptop, and we can do some research."

He shrugged. "That's fine."

Mona steered them right at the next corner, and he seemed to become more aware of their surroundings. "Are you done for the night, then?"

She nodded. "I can't really offer anything else without doing some research first, and I'm getting tired. I'll be able to think better after I get some good sleep."

Mona sort of expected him to leave her there, but he walked all the way back to the door of her dorm with her. They stopped on the sidewalk outside, and he looked up at the tall building--twenty floors, all covered in ivy and vines. 

"You know," he said, turning his eyes back toward her with a wry smile, "All I really asked for was advice. You don't have to go to all this trouble."

She blinked. "But... it is advice, really."

"Nah." He shoved his paws into his pockets and scuffed at the ground with one footpaw. 'Radko, you dumbass, get out of there,' is advice. This is... more. Not that I don't want you to, but..."

"Well." She struggled for words for a moment, but then blurted them when they came to her. "You came to me, and I saw a way to help you. I can't just  _not_."

He smiled warmly. "Yeah, I know."

 

 

Mona sat at Gezki's kitchen table, breathing in the aroma rising from the mug of tea between her hooves. She felt calmed by it, even though the tea itself was nothing special. 

"Okay, you've had that I-need-to-ask-you-something look on your face since you got here," Gezki said, sitting down across the table with her own mug of tea. "Spill."

Mona took a sip of her still-just-slightly-too-hot tea, took a deep breath, and began. She explained Radko's appearing on campus to ask her advice, their talk, and his situation. She talked carefully, her words measured to avoid leaving anything out, as Gezki watched and listened with an impassive face. She talked briefly about the meetings they'd been having as frequently as her homework allowed over the last few weeks, and the results of the research that she'd done. Getting him to cooperate with her plan had taken many tiny arguments, but none that were terribly hard to win or that he returned to after she had him convinced. Still, she was tired of the whole thing, and only determination and a real desire to see Radko's situation improved for his own sake kept her going with the same fervor she had when she'd begun. 

Finally, she stopped. The explanation aside, she did have a question to ask. 

"So, he has a job interview on Wednesday, and he needs to look cleaned up and put together, to give him a better chance. I wanted to ask you if... you wouldn't mind us using your place for that."

"Ooh! Girl, you know you don't even have to ask," Gezki exclaimed, and gave Mona a quick wink before she carried on. Of course you can bring him here. I get to help pick his wardrobe, right?"

Mona laughed. She had guessed at Gezki's answer, but never wanted to presume; anyway, she knew that Gezki would demand the whole story one way or another. "Of course. I was planning on taking him shopping, too. He says he thinks he has some clothes that would be good enough for an interview at a burrito shop, but... I've seen how he dresses, and I kinda doubt it."

Gezki clapped her paws together, and then rested them, clasped, on the table. "You have the bank account for that right now?"

Mona nodded. "I've been spending pretty sparingly, and I still have some saved up from the summer. I don't think he'd pick out any more than I make him get."

Gezki was watching her with a critical eye. "Good," she said, "But I have a feeling this'll end up costing you more than you are thinking it will. I'll chip in, halvsies on the clothes and I'll try to help with whatever else he ends up needing."

Mona's ears flicked forward. "Really? Gez, you don't have to--"

"Eh, I'd like to help the kid out, too. He's a good egg, he just needs a solid break. I don't mind contributing to that."

Mona beamed at her. "Thank you so much," she said, and reached across the table to clasp her paws. "This means a lot to me." 

"So, when are you bringing him over?"

"Would tomorrow evening be a good time to start?"

 

 

"You really didn't have to--"

"Once I told her the whole story, she practically volunteered." Mona gave him an exasperated look as she cut him off. "Don't worry, I'm not forcing her into anything. She's happy to help."

He muttered something under her breath, and she swiveled both ears backwards to better listen. "What was that?"

"Nothing," he said too quickly. Suspicious. She stopped and gave him a look. 

"Ugh, fine, just keep moving," he groused, shoving at her leg with his borrowed duffel bag. Once she turned and resumed climbing the stairs, he repeated himself loud enough to be heard: "I said I'd be happy if she didn't help."

That made Mona want to pause again, but she made herself keep going. "What do you have against Gezki?" she asked, her tone a little snappish.

"Nothing! She's just, I don't know, she's a lot."

Mona looked over her shoulder to give him an inquisitive look that didn't translate well, but he seemed to get the idea. "She has that stare, and she moves so quickly. She talks in demands. I don't know how to be around her."

At that, Mona did actually stop again, causing Radko to swear at her quietly, but she ignored that. "Are you  _intimidated_  by her?"

He rolled his eyes. "Why would I be intimidated by her?" His tone didn't sound genuine. "She's tiny. I could pick her up with one paw."

Mona laughed. "I'm easily twice her height and always have been as long as I've known her, and she even intimidated me when I first met her. Trust me, she'll grow on you."

He grumbled wordlessly and smacked her with the duffel bag, harder than before, and she took the hint and kept climbing. 

A couple more flights of stairs, and they reached Gezki's door. Mona opened it without knocking, knowing that they were expected, and called out, "Hello hello!" the moment she stepped inside. Radko followed silently. 

"In here!" Gezki called from the kitchen, and Mona lead the way towards her. She shrugged her backpack off of her shoulders and set it on the table, and Radko set the duffel bag next to it. 

"These all your clothes?" Gezki asked, looking right at him. Mona followed her eyes, and saw him swallow before he spoke. "Yeah, except the ones I'm wearing."

"Right, Mona, go set him up. Radko, would you like some tea? Coffee? Soda? I'll make you up something to drink when you get out of the shower."

Even though Mona had discussed the shower with him, he still looked more alarmed at the mention of it. "Er, coffee would be nice, thank you," he said, and then immediately turned to Mona, the look on his face saying  _get me out of here_. 

Mona managed to keep from laughing, but only barely. She gestured to him with her head. "This way, leave the bags there."

She lead him to the bathroom--just a little cramped for her, but sized perfectly for him--and showed him how to work the shower and where the soaps and shampoos were. "Use any you want, neither of us mind," she insisted. "And when you undress, throw the clothes you're wearing out the door so we can put them in with the rest, that way we can get all your laundry done at once."

He looked deeply concerned, but didn't argue with anything she was saying. "Okay," he said after a moment, "but what am I going to wear once I get out of the shower?"

Mona took a slow breath. This part had been Gezki's idea, and though she didn't object to it, it was still a level of awkward that she really didn't want to speak out loud. "My robe. It's hanging on the door, here," She reached out and touched it. "It might swallow you a little, but it shouldn't drag on the floor or anything." At his even greater look of alarm, she quickly added, "I don't mind at all, and it's clean. We tried to think of something else, but this is the easiest and quickest way to get both you and your clothes clean."

His worried look deflated a little, and he shrugged. "Yeah, okay."

"We have good hot water, so take as long as you need to. We'll be in the kitchen when you're done."

She quickly left, and returned to sit by Gezki in the kitchen. 

"He all set in there?"

"Yeah. He reacted to the robe thing about like I expected, but I talked him into it."

"Good. What's a little bathrobe-sharing among friends?"

Mona just shrugged. She sniffed the air; Gezki had put her little coffeemaker to work and had a kettle going for tea, and the smells in the air were heavenly, warm and rich and damp. A moment later, the sound of the bathroom door opening and then clicking shut again snapped her out of it, and she gave Radko an extra moment just in case he'd forgotten anything, then went to grab the clothes he'd thrown out on the floor outside the bathroom. She brought them back to the table with the rest, which Gezki had begun to pull out of the bags by the armloads. They stank like Radko always did, but Mona set them by the rest without comment. Unpleasant as the smell was, she'd grown accustomed to it.

She and Gezki quickly gathered his clothes into the washing machine. Mona flipped them all right-side out, trying not to get them too close to her nose, and Gezki, always thorough, checked each pocket. By the time they had everything in the machine, Gezki had amassed a few dollars in change, along with a few odds and ends--a button, a piece of paper that was worn beyond any use, a crumpled business card. They ran the washing machine with a double dose of detergent, brought the pocket stuff to the table, and sat down on the couch in the living room to watch a show and wait.

Thirty minutes later, just after Mona returned from moving the laundry into the dryer, Radko emerged from the bathroom meekly, wrapped in Mona's lavender colored robe, which went right down to his ankles. His mane was tousled and falling in limp, damp strands across his neck and face, and he stood awkwardly for a moment, just in the door where he was visible. He was hugging the bathrobe to him like he was afraid it was going to fall off. 

They invited him to sit down and have a cup of coffee, and he did so hesitantly, sinking reluctantly into the plush armchair near them. For a few minutes he just nursed his cup in silence and stared at the TV for lack of anything better to do, but he eventually started smiling and laughing along. Gezki watched in an animated way--it was her favorite show, and she knew all the in-jokes--but Mona found it entertaining enough to watch, and it felt like very little time had passed when the dryer's buzzer went off. 

Radko followed her to check it, and as she dragged his clothes out into a basket, he hovered behind her, still hugging the oversized robe self-consciously against himself. "Are you two going to pick something out for me?"

"Nah, go ahead and grab whatever is comfortable."

He shrugged, picked out a t-shirt, shorts, and a pair of boxers with one paw while he held onto the robe with the other, and then shuffled back to the bathroom. Mona left the basket of clothes where it was for the moment, and soon he rejoined them in the living room, looking much more comfortable in his own clothes. He was cleaner than Mona had ever seen him, and he looked no different than many of the students she shared a campus with. His shirt had a tiny, almost invisible stain by the collar and his shorts were cutoffs, but he simply looked casual instead of disheveled. 

Gezki turned off the TV abruptly. "Looking slick there, kid. Ready to go?"

His alarmed look was back. He set his coffee cup down carefully and glanced back and forth between them. "Go where?" 

Gezki clapped her paws together in excitement. "Oh, you didn't tell him about this part? This is going to be fun!"

Mona couldn't help but laugh at Radko's panicked face. 


	17. In Which They Go Shopping

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone! Surprise new chapter earlier than expected because I HAVE AN ICON NOW. I commissioned painted-bees on Tumblr for the sketch, and colored it myself. Don't they look cute? 
> 
> Anyway, new chapter to celebrate! And it's a little bit of a longer one because I didn't feel like splitting it up made a lot of sense. Some important conversations are had.

They all piled into Gezki's truck and drove to Savannah Central to shop for Radko's clothes. It was where he lived and where he would be working, so Rainforest district clothing--most of which was at least water resistant and tended to be styled quite differently--wouldn't suit him or the job he was interviewing for very well. Radko cast a skeptical look at Gezki as she climbed into the driver's seat, and another at Mona when she gestured for him to get into the middle one. 

"You... drive that thing?" he asked cautiously. 

Gezki gave him a look. "Who else is going to, you?"

"Don't have my license," he mumbled, and she snorted. "Yeah, I thought so. Get in, kid. Don't worry, I have custom mirrors on this thing, I can see out of it more than well enough to not crash us."

Still looking dubious, he climbed in. Mona gave him a chance to fasten his seat belt before she ducked in next to him, and he inched over to give her more room to fasten hers. Gezki was a little too small for the truck and Mona a little too large, but Radko would have been quite comfortable in it if it weren't for having to be shoved in between them. Still, his discomfort looked to be more social than physical, so Gezki, satisfied that they were in place, pulled out of the parking lot. 

In under an hour, they pulled into the parking lot of a mall that Gezki had chosen. It was a large but plain building, a little shabby here and there but not run-down, and a quarter of the parking lot was full. They clambered out of the truck--Mona and Radko both with relieved sighs and stretching--and headed for the nearest entrance. Radko, having been made aware of (and talked into going along with) their purpose, padded along at Mona's right resignedly. 

"You two know I won't be able to pay you back any time soon, right?"

"We aren't expecting you to," Mona assured him.

"At all," Gezki added, and Mona nodded. 

Radko groaned. "I'm sorry, I appreciate it, but... I don't like being in other mammals' debt," he said bitterly.

"All you owe us," Gezki said sharply, cutting off what Mona was about to say, "Is to get that job. Or get some other job. We don't expect a damn thing from you. Hell, you can get these clothes, get that job, and then fuck off to the far reaches of Zootopia and never talk to us again, and we wouldn't be coming after you with resentments or talk of debt." She paused, scratched an ear, and then added, "Well, Mona might come after you with resentments, I hear she's grown quite fond of you. But it's no fur off my back."

Radko snorted and Mona rolled her eyes, and in they went.

 

 

Two hours later, they sat down at the mall's food court with their purchases and their lunch, each glad to be off their feet. The bags piled on the bench seat next to Radko contained a few days' worth of clothing, most of which was simple, everyday work clothing that would fit the dress code of most food service and retail jobs. One bag, however, contained his new interview clothes--a nice, sky blue button up shirt and a pair of cool gray dress pants. Though he had looked at them skeptically when Gezki first suggested them to him, he'd come out of the fitting room smiling. Mona had had to admit to herself that he cleaned up more nicely than she'd expected him to. 

Over lunch, Mona and Gezki grilled him with basic interview questions looked up on their phones, and it soon became a game to ask him a question right after he'd taken a bite so that he had to hastily swallow in order to answer. After the fifth time they did that, he grabbed one of his fried caterpillars and threw it at Mona, making her squeak in disgust and surprise. 

"You two are worse than the other foster kids ever were," he griped, and then his face lit up as Mona retrieved the fried bug out of her lap and made to throw it at him. He opened his mouth wide and she, rolling her eyes, obliged and tossed it at his face. She missed and hit him in the chin, but he caught it before it hit the ground and popped it in his mouth anyway, grinning back at her. She laughed while wrinkling her nose at him. Gross as his antics were, she couldn't fault his playful, clownish nature. 

"Were they terrible?" Gezki asked, quietly eating her fruit salad and watching them with raised eyebrows. 

"Oh, definitely. You get a bunch of kids who've been shuffled around by the state, none of us knew each other, none of us cared about each other, and we all had resentments towards the system with nobody to take it out on but each other. We were  _vicious_. Most of it wasn't too bad, because none of us wanted to do anything to get ourselves into actual trouble, but there was a lot of bothering the shit out of each other until we were all on the verge of getting into one big fight. You'd think we'd rely on each other in situations like that, but it just made us mean instead."

"You too?" Mona asked.

He shrugged. "I'm not proud of it, but yeah. I didn't usually start it, but... I wasn't afraid to snap back when someone decided to screw with me. Some of them, I convinced to leave me alone. Others just got meaner with resistance."

Gezki waved her fork at them both. "I bet you're glad you never had to go through that, Mona. You were lucky."

"Yeah, I was," she agreed, but though she didn't look right at him, she was watching Radko in her peripheral vision. She had never mentioned the topic to him on purpose, and wasn't sure she wanted to now, but Mona could tell by the set of Gezki's ears that she had other plans. 

"Lucky is one way to put it, I guess," Radko said a little bitterly. "Having parents isn't usually considered lucky. Most people just call it normal."

"I mean that Mona is lucky she got to skip the foster system," Gezki clarified. Mona rotated both her ears towards her, then the nearest one back, trying to communicate,  _don't._  Gezki, a slight glint in her eye, ignored her. "Her adoption was lined up from the start."

Radko's bitter, back-turned ears flicked forward in surprise. He looked at Mona incredulously. "You're--you're adopted? You never said anything about that," he blurted after a moment.

Mona nodded.

"Wow," he said quietly, and then, even softer, "Now I feel speciesist, when I looked at your Furbook I remember thinking to myself that your parents look just like you."

Mona burst out laughing, mostly out of surprise at the statement. Gezki snorted, but then tilted her head at Radko. "Are you two friends on Furbook now? I thought you didn't use yours anymore."

He blinked. "I don't," he said, and looked at her in confusion. "I can still look people up, though. I guess you guys looked me up too?"

"Ah," Gezki said quietly, realizing that her mistake had revealed more than she meant to. Mona just turned her ears back to hide the blush that she knew would be coloring their insides. She got out her phone, pulled up her Furbook, and tapped a couple of buttons, opened a picture, then slid her phone across the table to Radko, who picked it up and looked at it curiously. "Whoa," he said quietly, "Is this you as a little kid?"

"Calf, but... yes. That's my birth mom with me."

He peered at it closely. "Okay, I take back what I said earlier. She  _really_ looks just like you."

Mona smiled. "Everyone says that."

"So what happened to her? And your birth dad?" He set the phone down and then got a sheepish look on his face. "I mean, if you don't mind saying."

"I don't," she assured him, taking her phone back and turning it face down on the table next to her plate. "My mom was single all her life, and that's how she preferred it. But when she was in her mid thirties, she decided that she wanted to have a calf, partner or no partner. So, I was... she got artificially inseminated." At his confused look, she added, "I was a test tube baby." He nodded in understanding, so she went on. "I had a good childhood, but... when I was about eight, my mom was diagnosed with a bone marrow cancer. She died when I was ten. But just like everything else... she had a plan for that. Well, that is, she made one almost as soon as she knew that she was terminal. Several months before she died, I met my adoptive parents for the first time, and by the time she couldn't take care of me anymore, the adoption was already decided on. So... I am an orphan, at least legally, but I never went without a family. That's why I didn't say anything about it. It's something we technically have in common, but I never went through the kind of ordeal that you have. I kinda suspected that if I brought it up early on, you'd... resent me for it," she admitted quietly, her eyes and ears down in embarrassment. 

Gezki and Radko snorted at the same time, and then gave each other an incredulous look, but then Radko looked back at Mona. "Honestly, if you hadn't been really tactful about it, I might have. It might have seemed like you were throwing your... fortune in my face. Not that I think you would, now!" he exclaimed when he saw the look on her face, "But, well... I didn't exactly have much trust for you, early on. Nothing against you, of course." His sheepish grin was back. "I guess you know, by now, how I am."

Mona nodded, a tiny laugh escaping her. "Yeah, I think I know what you mean."

Mona spared a little of her attention to notice Gezki's face in her peripheral vision as she returned to her sandwich, and knew she wasn't imagining the twinkle in Gezki's eyes. She silently debated with herself about whether she should give Gezki a talking-to later, and then decided that she wasn't bothered enough to. She didn't mind Radko knowing about her family, especially now that they knew each other pretty well; she'd just never seen an opportunity or a good enough reason to bring it up. 

 

 

Once they finished eating, they gathered their purchases and headed back to Gezki's truck. The ride back was quiet, and a little awkward. Radko kept casting brief glances at Mona, but seemed to be trying to be subtle about it; he didn't seem to realize that she could see him quite well without needing to turn her head or move her eyes. He was clearly deep in thought, but didn't seem to want to speak. Perhaps he just wasn't ready to say anything, but Mona guessed that Gezki's presence had something to do with his silence. 

Back at Gezki's apartment, they packed Radko's clothes back into the backpack and duffel bag, folding them this time so that they would remain unwrinkled and presentable. With the addition of his new clothes, they barely fit. Gezki didn't let him take his nice outfit off its hangers, though she did move the pants onto the same hanger with the shirt. 

"Trust me," she said, raising her eyebrows at him, "You'll just wrinkle it if you shove it in with the rest."

He huffed quietly. "I don't know that I'll be able to keep it clean, this way."

Gezki shrugged. "Have Mona hang on to it until you need it, if you're worried." 

He turned to Mona. "Would that, uh, be okay?"

Mona nodded. "Of course."

Radko shouldered the backpack--a little too big for him, but it fit fine with the straps adjusted--and hoisted the duffel bag up to his shoulder, where he rested it casually. "Well, I guess I'm gonna get going, then?" He paused, licked his lips once, and then tilted his head at Mona. "Are you heading out, or staying here?"

Mona had been intending to stay and spend a little time with Gezki, but she saw something in his face that made her reconsider. "Yeah, I should get back. I still have homework due soon." She picked up his hanger with the nice clothe

Gezki, ever perceptive, looked between them and snorted. "Sure, use me for my appliances and then leave me here alone," she said with a sarcastic grin. 

Radko looked stricken. "I didn't mean to--"

"Hush, kid," she said, shaking her head at him. "I'm only kidding. Feel free to come back if you need laundry done badly enough and you're broke enough that coming all the way over here is worth it," she said, walking up and clapping him on the shoulder that didn't have a duffel on it. He flinched slightly, which she pretended not to notice, but Mona could tell by the set of her ears that she was amused. 

"See you soon, Gez," She said, moving towards Radko and the door, and he turned around, his tail wagging once in apparent relief. 

"Anytime, dearios!" Gezki called as they stepped out. Mona gave one last wave and then closed the door.

Radko let out a breath as though he'd been holding it for minutes rather than seconds. 

"Want me to take one of those?"

"Sure." He relinquished the duffel bag into her care, and she started leading the way up the stairs. Radko stopped just before the first step and looked at her quizzically. 

"Where are you going?"

"I figured you'd want to take the sky tram."

He still didn't move. "Do you, er, fit on the sky tram?"

She laughed. "You don't take it very often, do you?"

He shook his head.

"Every fifth car is double-sized. They still aren't big, but we should both fit in one."

Satisfied with that answer, he stepped onto the stairs behind her, and she turned to continue the climb. 

 

 

The sky tram stop at the top of the apartment tower was devoid of mammals, and they stood on the damp platform in silence while they waited for the next car to come. While they waited, another resident of the tower, a small lemur, walked up the stairs, gave both of them a glance, and then promptly got on the next car ahead of them; she seemed to have guessed that they weren't waiting for one of the smaller cars. The very next car was their double-sized one, and they climbed in gingerly. 

Even in the larger car, Mona had to duck her head, and she sat down as soon as she was able. Radko climbed in after her and closed the door just in time for the car to start moving again, and he sat down next to her with a slight bump. With both bags there with them, the fit was a little cramped, but by leaning on their respective sides, they avoided being squished together. 

They were silent for the first five minutes, but just as Mona was getting deep into her thoughts, Radko spoke up. 

"I guess I shouldn't see you any differently because you're adopted," he said quietly, only barely loud enough for her to hear over the sky tram's mechanisms, "but it feels... significant."

Mona smiled. "In a way... it is. It changed me. Even as a calf, even when I lost my mom, I knew how lucky I was. I knew that there were other children out there who lost their parents and were left with nobody. Or children whose parents weren't suitable to raise them and were taken by the state. I did some research as a teenager, and I learned about all the things that I had avoided going through. And... it made me want to do something. To help others who weren't as lucky as I was." She chuckled and added, "I guess it's significant to us, because I probably never would have met you if I wasn't adopted."

He snorted in amusement, and they fell silent again for another minute. The quarters were too close to make eye contact anything but awkward, so Mona watched the rainforest go by outside the car. The sky tram wasn't the quickest way to travel, but it was by far the most scenic. 

"Thanks for doing all of this for me."

This time, Mona did turn to look at him. His expression was sheepish, his ears down, and she smiled back at him, though she quickly turned to look outward again because looking at him brought their faces uncomfortably close. "Hey, what are friends for?"

She caught his nod out of the corner of her eye. "I guess so," he said, so quietly that she could only assume that she'd heard correctly. 

As they traveled over the Rainforest District towards Savanna Central, Radko became increasingly interested in the scenery. He shifted in his seat to peer over the edge and straight down, something that Mona had always had a hard time stomaching. He didn't seem to notice that his change in position had pushed his footpaw up against Mona's hoof on the floor, and she decided not to draw attention to it. 

"I don't think I've ever been up this high not in a building," he said conversationally as the upper trunks of the trees of the rainforest--real and fake--passed smoothly by on either side of them. "The air is actually pretty nice up here."

Mona laughed. "It's been a while since I've heard you complain about the humidity here, I almost forgot that it bothered you."

He shrugged. "I don't like how it feels, but mostly I don't like the smell of wet leaf litter. It's pretty impossible to get away from in most of the Rainforest District."

"I guess I can see that." Neither the smell nor the humidity had ever bothered Mona, but then again she was born and raised in a real rainforest, where that smell was part of every breath she'd taken as a young calf. 

"I've kinda gotten used to it, though. Never had a lot of reason to come here before Helping Paws set me up with you. It doesn't bother me as much as it did at first."

It suddenly occurred to Mona that it wasn't too different than her objections to his personal smell, and she snorted out a laugh before she could stop herself. Radko gave her a weird look. "What?"

"It's nothing."

"Something I said was funny?" He seemed more bemused than annoyed, and the light humor of the situation made Mona decide to tell him.

"A little... don't get offended, but..."

"Oh dear, here we go." He leaned back against the railing and crossed his arms so he could watch her face. 

She swallowed another snort and said, "So, for a while after we started volunteering together, any time we were near each other, I was similarly bothered by  _your_  smell." Already he was starting to look a little offended, so she hastily continued, "I got quite a bit more used to it until it didn't really bother me any more, but then today, I realized that you don't actually smell bad at all." She paused to giggle helplessly for a few seconds, a combination of the awkwardness of the situation and real amusement making her unable to hold it in. "It's just that you needed a shower!" 

He yipped out a laugh as well, and grinned at her. "Well, you're not wrong," he admitted, all offense gone. Mona was glad, though she wondered if she should have lied. It was true that he smelled so much better freshly clean, but even under the faint, lingering floral smell of the shampoo he'd used, she could still smell him, and it still wasn't a scent she'd ever seek out. He still smelled sharp and a little rank--like a predator. She wondered if her instincts made her dislike it, or if it was just preference. 

They both returned to watching the scenery. Mona was happy to watch the treetops go by, a nice way to enjoy the height without thinking too hard about how high up they were. Radko, as before, continued to peer right over the edge in fascination. 

A fifteen minute ride later, they disembarked. 

 

 

Radko walked all the way back to her dorm with her. He had checked the transit map on his phone when they got off the sky tram, and said that the train stop near campus was no further than the other closest one, so he might as well walk with her. "Besides," he said with a cheeky grin, "This way, I don't have to carry both these bags by myself."

She snorted at him in mock indignation, but didn't argue. Neither of the bags were exactly heavy--Radko, though smaller, was easily as strong as she, if not stronger, so she knew that he wasn't suffering under the weight either--but she saw no reason to be stubborn about it. 

At the dorm door, she passed the duffel bag to him, but he set it promptly on the driest spot on the sidewalk. He turned to face her with a smile on his face. It was a gentle smile, a sort of peaceful happiness that she didn't often see in him. "Well, I guess I'll know in a few days if I get the job," he said, and pulled a face. "I'm a little nervous."

"I'm sure you'll be fine. It's not like a fast food place is going to have really high standards."

"Wow, thanks," he said, cocking a sarcastic ear at her, but when she started to backpedal, he just laughed. "No, no, you're right, and it's a good thing. Anything to get me off the streets."

Mona sobered a little. "You're sure you'll be alright out there?"

The gentle smile was back, and he nodded. "I've been doing this for over a year. A little more won't hurt me. Besides, I still have a couch to sleep on for another three weeks, and I'll figure something out after that."

She sighed, but smiled back. "Well just... let me know if you need anything? Even if you think I can't help. I... worry about you sometimes."

"I know." He lowered his muzzle but looked up at her, and his expression and the angle made him look almost like a child. "I'll be fine." He took a deep breath, seeming to steele himself, and then took a step forward and held out his arms. Mona blinked, but didn't let herself hesitate for more than half a second. She bent down to accept his hug so that his face wouldn't go right into her chest. For an odd, slightly awkward moment his chin rested on her shoulder as they embraced, but they kept it brief and both stepped back before Mona could dwell too hard on it. She supposed that it made sense for them to be on hugging terms now, but in many ways, she was still getting used to their friendship in the first place. He smiled up at her again, but even more awkwardly than before, and then turned away to gather the duffel bag, which he took a moment to position the strap of before he looked at her again. "Well, I guess I'll see you soon?"

"Good luck with that interview." She stepped back towards the doors without turning away.

"Thanks," he said sincerely, turning to walk away, but he looked over his shoulder and added, "For everything. Seeya around, Mona."


	18. In Which Radko Acquires a Bicycle

_I got the job. I told them two weeks until I can start. I hope that's enough for the bicycle to get here?_

Mona grinned at her phone when she saw the text. As soon as she and Radko had picked a place for him to apply, she'd contacted her parents back home in Fioli and asked them to dig her old childhood bicycle out of the shed and ship it to her. One very long explanation later, they happily agreed, and shot down her attempts to offer to pay for the shipping. 

"You're already putting so much of yourself into this," her father said warmly, "let us help you out a bit."

They had even paid to have the bicycle tuned up before sending it; years of disuse had made several parts rusty, and the tires, inner tubes, and seat were all but destroyed by dry rot. Still, it was a nice bicycle. It was adjustable in several places to allow a variety of small-to-medium sized animals to ride it comfortably, and it had been Mona's bicycle for years as a calf. Though she was now too big for it, it wasn't a child's bike; the whole thing was built to last, and to ride well in almost any condition. Her parents had been of the opinion that it was better to buy her a more expensive bicycle that would fit her as she grew and last for years than it would be to have to buy a series of cheaper bicycles every few years as she grew. Now, since the result was still in workable condition even years later, she was doubly glad. She suspected that, with some adjustment, it would fit Radko perfectly. With the faded paint a respectable shade of green--still her favorite color years later--nobody would know that it had once been a young girl's bike, and Radko would have his delivery vehicle. 

_They shipped it yesterday, so you should have a few days to get used to it before you start the job. Would you like me to send you the tracking number?_

_That would be cool, thanks_

Mona switched to the text conversation with her mother and copied the text with the number that had been sent to her yesterday. She sent it to Radko, who texted back a few minutes later,  _Ok, what do I do with this?_

She told him the carrier name and explained where to put in the number in, and several minutes later, he finally responded,  _It says it's still in Fioli._

_They just dropped it off yesterday. It might take a couple of days to get on a truck._

_Ok, thanks. I'll keep an eye on it._

_Hopefully it'll arrive quickly so that you get time to get used to it before you start work._

_No kidding. I bet I'm about to discover just how out of shape I am._

She laughed at that one.  _At least the area is pretty flat._

 

 

Nine days later, Mona got a call from her dorm's RA on duty at almost exactly three in the afternoon. The moment she hung up, she texted Radko to tell him that the bicycle had arrived. He'd been skulking in various parks and coffee shops nearby all day; they had both been keeping an eye on the tracking for the package, and he was eager enough and bored enough to be in the area before it arrived. 

The package she picked up from the mailroom was large and heavy, but not so big that she couldn't lift it. In fact, it was quite a bit smaller than she remembered the bicycle being, and for a moment she wondered about that until she realized that all of the places where it adjusted had probably been contracted as far as possible or angled to make the package as small as it could be. 

Just as she was trying to decide whether to take it upstairs while she waited for Radko, he texted that he was at the front door. She quickly scooped up the package and went to meet him. She brought him to a little seating area at the side of the dorm that had a large awning over it, and together they moved chairs aside and sat on the ground to extract the bicycle from its cardboard entrapment. 

Radko attacked it with gusto. His claws were much better at breaking through the tape than her hooves, and at one point he grabbed a particularly tough spot--Mona guessed that there were at least five layers of tape overlapping--in his teeth and yanked it off. She helped where she could, but mostly stayed out of his way as he worked. She would never have admitted it, but the fur along the back of her neck was prickling at the sight of Radko's big, sharp predator teeth bared and gnashing at tape and cardboard, and the feeling of unease made her prefer to keep just slightly more distance than she would have otherwise.

Finally, they separated the bicycle from the heap of cardboard and tape that it had been wrapped in. Radko stood up to inspect it, holding it upright with one paw on a handlegrip, and he tilted his head. "Not to insult," he remarked, "but this is the strangest bike I've ever seen."

Mona laughed. "Here, let me help you," she said, shuffling onto her knees and approaching it. It took time for her to remember where all of the releases and clamps were for the size and angle adjustments, but in ten minutes, she had it all adjusted into a configuration that she thought would fit him well enough. She stepped back, and he swung a leg over the frame. He yipped in alarm and swung the leg back over before he could lose his balance or put any real weight on it, and promptly dropped the seat down a few inches. Mona tried not to laugh, but he still shot her a playful frown when he heard her snort. 

"Quiet, Miss Longlegs," he growled, and tried again. This time he looked much more comfortable, and was able to touch the ground with both toes while sitting on the seat. Carefully, without putting a paw on the pedals just yet, he waddle-wheeled it out onto the sidewalk and tried it out. 

Mona followed nearly to the sidewalk and stood watching as he found his balance and rolled off. It was pretty clear that he hadn't been kidding when he said that he hadn't been on a bicycle in years, but the old adage that one never really forgets how to ride a bicycle proved true for him. With only a few waddles, he rode down the wide sidewalk slowly, dodging the occasional pedestrian student coming back from class. He put his feet down to turn around at the intersection, which wasn't quite big enough to turn around in, and rode back a little more quickly than he'd ridden away. He stopped just in front of Mona, grinning. 

"How do you like it?"

"It'll take some getting used to, but it's good," he said, and reached over to offer a high-paw. Amused, she reciprocated, and he swung his leg back over the frame in a not-exactly-graceful dismount and with the bike between them. She was glad he had chosen that side to get down; she didn't fancy getting kicked. 

For a moment they stood, unsure what to do next, and then he fiddled with the brakes and look down. "I guess I should get back to Savannah Central. It's going to be a long ride."

She started to nod, but then flicked her ears back in concern. "You're not going to take a bus? Most of them have bike racks on the front."

He shrugged. "I looked that up before I came, actually. The place I'm staying is nine miles from here, but it would take four bus transfers to get there. And probably longer than the ride would take." He grinned and added, "Besides, I need the exercise. It'll help prepare me for the job."

She chuckled. "Okay. But... call me if you need help."

He rolled his eyes. "Mona, I could walk that far."

"I know! Still, just let me know if you need anything."

"Yes, Mom," he said jokingly, swinging his leg back over the bike, and Mona, exasperated, made as though to push him over. Laughing, he rolled hastily away from her. "I'll seeya soon, Mona!" he called over his shoulder as he rolled away. Mona stood watching him leave, a smile on her face. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bit of a short one this time, but after this we're time-jumping into a longer section. Wish Radko luck with his new job!


	19. In Which Radko Acquires An Address

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys! I've been a little slow at updating lately, and this didn't seem worth splitting up, so have a long chapter!

Six weeks later, Radko convinced Mona to take a break from her rigorous, self-inflicted study schedule to get off campus and 'fun activity', but he wouldn't tell her what it was. Mona, realizing that he had a point about her making a hermit of herself over studying for finals, decided that one day of leisure wouldn't hurt anything and humored him.

She got off the train that took her near his neighborhood--or at least, the neighborhood of his workplace--and looked for him on the platform. A slight shiver went though her; the rainforest was as warm as ever, but Savannah Central was well into its cold season, and though it was nowhere near freezing, she was still a little chilly. She spotted Radko, and envied his jacket; he was dressed for the weather, and she was not. She approached him, and by way of greeting, she said, "Is this payback for me not telling you about the skating thing before I dragged you into it?"

"Ha!" He yipped a laugh and grinned at her. "No, actually, I almost forgot that you'd sprung that on me." They headed out of the station, Mona following his lead while still walking beside him, and he took a sideways glance at her. "To be honest, this probably isn't going to be nearly that fun."

Mona cocked a concerned ear at him. "Should I be concerned? You're using the voice that makes me think I should be concerned."

That had him grinning again. "You know me so well, Mom. No, it's nothing too bad. I just--well, you know how I've been looking at places lately?"

Mona's ears flicked. "Yes? You said you've been narrowing it down."

"Yeah, well, there's this one place that I think I might go for?"

"Oh, is it good?"

"...Actually, that's why I asked you to come out here. I wanted you to take a look at it with me."

Mona blinked. "I'm no expert on housing, but sure." She laced her ears back, her expression half smile, half frown, and added, "You sure know how to show a girl a good time."

"Hey, it'll use a different part of your brain than all those boring textbooks. Besides, that's not all I had in mind. One of my friends at work keeps telling me about this fantastic frozen smoothie place that's close enough to the place to walk to, so I figured we could go check it out afterwards. You know, get some actual relax on. I hope that'll make it worth coming out here."

Mona's ears perked up. "I'll accept your compensation," she said stiffly, but when Radko raised his eyebrows at her, she laughed. "I would have come out anyway if you had asked, but that sounds great. I just hope I don't freeze my tail off."

He raised his eyebrows and looked her over. "Are you kidding? It's not even chilly."

"You have a jacket on."

He laughed and shrugged it off immediately. Before Mona could realize what he was doing and stop him, he swung it up and haphazardly over her shoulders instead. "There you go. I was getting too warm anyway."

Mona accepted the jacket with chagrin, but tried not to show it. Thanks in part to a membership to a 24-hour gym that Gezki had gifted to him, Radko had easy access to showers, and was much better smelling nowadays. Still, the jacket was full of his sharp, musky smell, and she knew that it would cling to her after she took it off. She quickly resigned herself to her fate. It wasn't worth risking insulting him to insist that she didn't want it. Though it fit her poorly--Radko was almost as broad-shouldered as she, but shaped differently otherwise--it did keep just a little more warmth in. 

They hopped on a local bus to get to the apartment complex where Radko was thinking of renting. It was a mile and a half from the train station, and Radko used the opportunity to tell Mona a few humorous stories about his coworkers' antics. Some of them just had her giving him confused ears, to which he huffed and said, "You'd just have to have been there," but a couple of them were actually quite funny. Once he ran out of stories, she smiled to herself in the silence, glad that he was making friends at work; his departure from his old life had left him with few mammals to socialize with, and though he didn't often hang out with them outside of work, he clearly relished their company. 

"My bank account is feeling pretty happy," he blurted suddenly, and smiled toothily when she looked over at him. "Thanks for helping me set that up."

"Of course, I'm glad you have a safe place to keep your wages."

"Yeah, that... that was a good call. I've never been robbed, but... you're right that it's dangerous to carry so much cash around. It would really suck to lose almost a month's worth of pay right now. I'd have to hold off on finding a place."

Mona nodded. "You must be excited to be nearing the end of couch hopping."

He pulled a face but didn't answer. Mona, wise by now to his expressions, laced her ears and looked him in the eye. "Are you okay?"

"Fine! I'm fine, really. This is our stop."

They got off the bus, but Mona wasn't willing to let the subject drop. She could tell by his back-turned ears that he knew that, and so she waited as they walked the last few blocks to the apartment complex. After a block, he finally admitted, "I've been out of a couch for a couple weeks now."

Mona looked at him with concern. "Where are you staying?"

"A week ago, I was mostly sleeping under a bridge in a park, until an officer came along and rousted me out. She was nice about it, though, even gave me a tip about a shelter nearby. They'll let anyone stay for about a week without asking any questions, so I have been sleeping there. They're overcrowded, so I've mostly been making do with sleeping on the floor with my backpack for a pillow, but it beats hard concrete."

Mona made a sympathetic noise, but Radko stopped and looked at her, a smile on his face--a real, happy smile, that gave her pause and stopped her from expressing any more concern for the moment. "It's nothing I haven't dealt with before," he said gently, "and like you said, it's almost over. I had a couple of people offer me somewhere to stay for a little money, but," he shrugged. "The price wasn't good enough. I wanted to save as much as possible, so I could make the deposit and the first month's rent, and have some left over--just in case, you know?" 

He turned and fell in beside her again, and a sudden wave of excited pride inspired Mona to put her arm around his shoulders in a quick hug. Grinning, he grabbed her around the waist in a bear hug, which made her squeak in alarm, and then just as she had recovered from her surprise, he prickled at her sides with his dancing claws. Bleating in distress, she wrenched him off--not terribly difficult because of her larger size--and they stood, recovering from the moment, across from each other on the sidewalk. Mona wasn't sure what to think--she had never liked being tickled, even by her close friends, and while she'd become pretty close to Radko, his sudden grab had made her heart race in an uncomfortable way. She couldn't bring herself to return his smile. 

After only a second, he saw from her expression that his roughhousing hadn't gone over very well, and he quickly shoved his paws back in his pockets and turned away. "Sorry," he said quietly. They resumed walking. 

"It's okay," Mona assured him. "You just spooked me for a second."

He grunted noncommittally, but he looked relieved. Still, the next block or so was walked in awkward silence. 

"Here it is," Radko said, turning to the right. 

The apartment complex consisted of twelve two-story buildings, all the same squarish, uneven shape, and a single-story office building immediately to their left, nearest the street. A quick glance at the nearest one showed four doors, two upstairs and two down, and a sidewalk that lead around the building; Mona guessed that there were four more units on the other side. The whole place was designed in that stocky, squat way of housing intended for mammals of many sizes, with tall, squarish doors that had handles on the bottom half of the door, and windows whose lower sills were an easy six inches below the height of the door handles. The effect was much like it usually was for such construction; any mammal the size of a raccoon or larger, but no bigger than a black bear would be able to live there with no real difficulty, but only a mammal right in the middle of the size range--conveniently, such as Radko himself--would find the place truly comfortable.

Mona made some noncommittal comment about it looking pretty nice, and Radko lead the way into the office. Inside, he lead the way immediately down the hall and to the main office, ignoring signs on the wall that labeled it as such, and Mona surmised that he must have been here before. He stepped into an open door, leaving room for Mona to step in next to him, and smiled politely at the rabbit buck at the low desk, who smiled back. "Hi, how can I help you?"

"Hi, I'm, uh, Radko Crocuta, I was here the other day to look at an apartment. I'm thinking of renting here. I'd ah, like to take one more look before I decide, if that's okay."

The buck's smile broadened. "Certainly!" he said, getting up from his desk and pulling a keyring out of a desk drawer. "Are you planning to sign a lease soon?" As he stepped around the desk, he noticed Mona lurking in the doorway. "Oh, hello," he said, stopping. "Sorry, I didn't see you there. Would you like a tour as well?"

"I'm just here with my friend," she said, pointing a thumb at Radko. "So yes, I'll come along, but I'm not looking to rent right now."

"Right on, right on. This way, then!" Threading neatly between them, he headed quickly towards the office's front door, his keyring jingling quietly. He set a brisk pace, but for Mona and Radko, it still made for a casually slow walking pace. Still, they were in no hurry, and so they followed without comment. 

Their guide began talking as he lead them towards the nearest apartment building, clearly a canned spiel about the place. The units were thirty-one years old, and had 'seen some love,' according to him, but he claimed that they were all still in good working order, with all appliances replaced in the last eight ears. "And if anything does happen to break, we have maintenance right here on the property any time the office is open, so we can get any issues you have taken care of quickly."

Mona, remembering a tip that Gezki had given her once, tuned him out and pulled out her phone. Glancing up at the sign near the street, she typed the name of the place into Zoogle, and quietly perused reviews left by other mammals while she followed. She had only skimmed a few by the time they reached the door to the apartment that the rabbit was leading them too, and she put her phone away for a moment in order to pay better attention. The door was under an overhang, set into the side of the building, and roofed first by the walkway to the upper units and then by the roof itself. The rabbit had to reach up to just above his head height in order to unlock the door, but it didn't appear to give him any trouble. He pushed the door open smoothly and lead the way inside, giving a little hop just inside to reach a light switch that was a few inches higher than the doorknob had been. 

The room lit up, and Mona took a good look around. It was small, but not cramped. The living room, in which they were standing, contained a couch that filled one wall and a TV stand that almost filled the other. At the other end was the kitchen. Next to the TV stand, just before the floor changed from carpet to tile, was a folding double door. On the same wall, but at the other end of the room, another door--this one normal--lead out of the kitchen. Mona could see a washing machine through the ajar door, but not much else from their angle. 

The rabbit lead them through the whole place. The folding doors lead to the bedroom, which had a small, simple, doorless closet set into one wall. The whole place had only two windows, one in the bedroom and the one next to the exterior door. The washer and dryer were in an alcove in the bathroom, which was simple as well--a bathtub with a shower head, a tiny sink and counter, and a toilet. The toilet was a similar design to the rest of the place--awkwardly low (though the seat did still reach up almost to their guide's collarbone), but wide enough that it probably could have seated an elephant, with a very broad seat brim that would allow many sizes of mammal to sit but without too much risk of the smaller ones falling in. Mona blinked out of her thoughts as Radko nudged her, and she looked at him, then glanced around. The rabbit, finished with his tour, had gone back to stand by the front door. Mona surmised by his bored, but patient expression and the way Radko was inspecting the faucet on the sink that he was giving them a chance to look around for a minute or two on their own. 

Mona gave Radko a little nod and moved through the apartment on her own. She glanced over the appliances, opened both the washer and the fridge, and went into the bedroom to look around once more. When she came back out, she noticed something that she had not seen before--a temperature control unit of some sort that was mounted into the wall underneath the window next to the door. 

"Is that the heater?"

"Yes ma'am, and AC."

"Does it do humidity control?"

"No, it does not." He glanced between them, and then said to Radko, "Hyenas aren't a species that requires humidity control, right?"

He shrugged. "We're a savanna species, so I guess not ."

He turned back to Mona. "We can install humidity units complimentarily for species that legally require them, and we can install one at the tenant's request for a fee otherwise."

Mona nodded her thanks and then went back to looking around. Radko was looking around too, but he seemed to be going through the motions, rather than looking for anything in particular. The moment Mona, finished looking around the little place, stood still near the rabbit in the living room and turned to watch him, he stopped looking in the kitchen cupboards and approached them both.

The rabbit confirmed that they were done, then lead them back outside and locked the door. He asked if they had any more questions--they did not--and left them there on the sidewalk as he returned to the office. 

"So, what do you think?"

She took a deep breath and let it out as soft sigh, waiting a moment longer until the keen ears of the rabbit had vanished into the office once more before she started speaking. 

"It seems okay. It's even smaller than Gezki's place, and there are definite signs of wear all over. The appliances are old. What is the rent?"

He told her, and she flicked her ears. "That's... a third of what Gezki is paying."

He blinked. "It's not great," he admitted, "but I can afford it, and it's much better than homelessness." He laughed as he said it, but Mona felt an awkward combination of humor and pity that just came out as a slightly strangled snort. Radko looked at her in puzzled amusement, but didn't try to ask. 

Mona pulled out her phone again and returned to the reviews that she had been reading before. Radko cocked an ear at her, but gave her a moment. 

After a couple of minutes of standing there--Radko took to inspecting the scenery with his paws in his pockets after a moment--she handed her phone to him. He took it, and his ears pricked up when he saw what she'd been reading. 

"I skimmed a couple dozen reviews by tenants. It looks like the main complaint is that maintenance is slow to respond when something goes wrong, and that they're unforgiving to lease-breakers, but... from what I understand, that's not really that uncommon with cheap rental apartments."

He nodded. "This is a great idea," he said, and tried to scroll down. Like Lilac had months previous, he frowned when her phone's screen didn't respond to his pawpad.

"Use your claw," she instructed, and then carried on. "I use Zoogle reviews a lot when I'm trying to decide whether or not to buy something or go somewhere. I even looked up my university, and a couple others, while I was trying to decide where I wanted to go." He snorted at that, but seemed more focused on the screen, so she added, "The reviews will skew more negative than public perception actually is, because angry mammals are more likely to get online and vent their frustrations. Still, it can sometimes help give you an idea of problems that others have had with a place, and decide if things like that are worth potentially having to deal with."

He looked up from the screen and smiled at her. "You really do look at these all the time, don't you?"

She nodded. "Especially product reviews, when I'm buying online. Things with a higher rating will usually be better, but even for the ones that are mostly highly rated, it's usually a good idea to check out the negative reviews and see if there are any patterns. A lot of products fail in predictable ways, even if the failure only happens to a small number of units. Sometimes you can even get an idea of how the manufacturer is about customer service by looking at reviews. Sometimes you'll see a few negative reviews that have been updated saying that the company reached out to fix the problem." She suddenly realized that she was rambling, but his expression was one of amused interest, so she pushed her mild embarrassment aside. "Anyway, do you think that stuff is something you can live with?"

He put on a droll expression. "Mona, have I maybe mentioned that I've been homeless for months?"

She groaned. "Okay, I get it, point taken. So are you going to sign the lease, then?"

He stared at the ground for a moment, but then a soft, yet still toothy smile slowly spread over his muzzle. "Yeah, I think I will."

 

 

Three hours and far too much paperwork later, Radko had the keys to his new apartment in paw. It was getting late in the evening, and Mona, tired, was almost regretting having stayed, but the grin on his face when he asked her if she'd like to stop by his new place was worth it. 

She insisted on frozen smoothies first, even though the apartment was just across the parking lot from the office they'd just stepped out of, but he laughed and complied with her demand in good humor. 

They walked to the little shop Radko had heard of, only to be met with disappointment. They were twenty minutes past its closing time. They stood on the sidewalk outside and stared forlornly at the locked door for a moment, and then Radko sighed, shoved his paws deep into his pockets, and turned to Mona. "I'm really sorry, I didn't expect it take that long."

She put a hoof on his shoulder. "It's okay. We'll just have to stop by some other time when I come over to hang out?"

He grinned at that. "Now that I have a place for you to come  _to_."

"Exactly."

Back in good spirits, he pulled his phone out of his pocket. After a moment, he looked up at her. "The nearest grocery store is almost on the way back, we could pick up something tasty there?" He paused to wait for her answer, saw her thinking about it, and added, "If you want to just head back home, I totally understand."

She checked the time on her phone. "Oh, why not. I doubt I'd do any more studying tonight, even if I did go back."

"Attagirl."

She rolled her eyes, but fell in beside him.

 

 

Forty minutes later, they made it back to Radko's apartment complex. What had started as a snack run had turned into a grocery trip; while they were at the store, they had started talking about what he would need to get for his new place, and by the time they left, they were carrying a few bags of groceries each. Much of their contents was snack food, but Mona had pointed out that Radko had a fridge and cupboards now, all bare, and he'd been caught up enough in the novelty of it to pick out a couple dozen items before he remembered that they were supposed to be there for some quick celebratory food, and after that he hustled them to the checkout before anything else could catch his eye. 

Mona took a couple of Radko's bags to free up his paws so he could fish out his new key and unlock his door. He turned the knob, but then paused for a long second before pushing the door open. Mona was on the point of giving him a little nudge, when he finally opened it on his own. 

The interior was much too dark to see anything, with the only light coming from a street lamp outside and trickling in the blinds next to them, but Radko reached over and flicked the light switch without hesitating, making Mona suspect that he could see better in the dark than she. However, the flick did nothing to the darkness, and for a moment, they both just stood there.

"Right," Radko said with a soft huff, "They did say the utilities might not be on until tomorrow." He walked over to the kitchen counters and set his bags down, and Mona followed him mostly by sound and let him take the rest of the bags from her. He didn't bother trying to put the groceries away in the dark. "I guess that means the fridge isn't on, so we just need to eat all the cold stuff now."

Mona laughed. "It's a good thing most of what you bought isn't perishable."

He rummaged through the bags, swearing as he dropped two heavy things--they sounded like cans to Mona's ears--on the kitchen floor. She realized that even he couldn't see much, especially here, where it was darker than it was near the window. 

Relieved of her burden, she made her way carefully back towards the tiny slits of light coming through the mini blinds. She reached out and touched them, and felt around until she found the strings. She gave them a good, steady pull, and then stepped back to admire the square of yellowish light that she'd let in onto the carpet. Now, barely able to make out the walls due to the bouncing light, she made her way back to Radko, who was sighing over the eggs.

"I hope eggs don't go bad in a day," he said mournfully. "I love eggs."

Mona, curious, pulled out her phone. As she unlocked it and the bright screen lit up her face, she realized suddenly that she'd been carrying a light source the whole time, and snorted quietly at herself. Refusing to be distracted for long, she Zoogled the few groceries that Radko couldn't put in his unpowered fridge, and then said, "Eggs will keep for a few days, maybe even a few weeks, without refrigeration. The fruit will be fine as well, it just keeps a little longer in the cold. The packages of grubs should be fine for a couple of days at least as long as they stay sealed. The fish, though, you need to cook and eat no later than tomorrow afternoon. Out of everything you bought, it'll go bad the quickest."

Radko stopped fussing over the groceries and appeared at her elbow to look at the screen, startling her slightly, but he didn't seem to notice her twitch. He glanced over the last page she'd ended up on, the one describing the proper storing of fish, and mumbled. "Well, I guess I'll just have to sniff-test it when I do get electricity, because I don't have any way to cook it right now." He pulled out his own phone, turned on the flashlight, and went about taking all of the groceries out of their bags and setting them on the counter in a cluster. Mona put hers away and joined him, working by the light of his phone so that her hooves were both free. She fished the two containers of sorbet out of the rest, and handed one to him when he turned to see what she was doing. She set hers on the counter, away from the other groceries, and flicked her ears. "We didn't remember about silverware," she said quietly.

Radko started laughing loudly, and she couldn't help but join him. She turned to the sink and tried the faucet, and to her surprise, it gurgled loudly and then spat water out into the sink. It took only a moment for the empty pipes to fill and the water stream to even out. She paused for a moment, then leaned down to stick her muzzle under the stream, slurping until she'd had enough to drink. She turned it off and turned around to find Radko watching her with what looked like an amused expression, though she could barely see his face. "What?"

"I think that's the most undignified thing I've ever seen you do," he said, and laughed. He stepped up beside her to drink out of the faucet as well, with much lapping and even more slurping than she had done. 

"Well, I guess we could go back to the store and get some silverware, and maybe some ice," Mona suggested quietly when he had finished and the apartment was once again silent. 

"The freezer will keep some of the cold in even when it's not turned on, right? Like an icechest?"

"I would think so."

"Then fuck it. I'm just gonna throw everything cold in there for now. We can eat this stuff without silverware," he said, waving his little container of sorbet around. 

Mona gave him a look that she doubted he saw, because the light coming from his phone was pointed at the floor. "That sounds like a big, sticky mess."

He laughed. "Who cares? We have running water, so we can always wash it off later." He crossed the room to the living room section and sat on the floor against the wall, already prying the lid off of his carton. Mona, realizing that he was right, joined him and sat a couple of feet away against the same wall. She, too, pried the lid off of hers, and then Radko set down his phone, the back on the floor, and plunged them into relative darkness; again, the only light came through the window. It crossed Mona's outstretched foothooves, and Radko shuffled and slouched against the wall until his footpaws were in the light as well. He stretched them, the flex making his claws even more prominent, and then relaxed them and stuck his muzzle into the carton in his paws with a wet slurping sound. 

Mona diligently worked on her own carton, her long, prehensile tongue allowing her to keep most of her face clean, though tiny, sticky droplets soon ringed her mouth. As they both ate, her eyes adjusted to the dim light, and by the time he was half done, she was able to make out the sticky mess that absolutely covered Radko's face. He noticed her looking and stuck his tongue out at her, then nudged her foot with his as he set the container down and licked most of the mess off of his muzzle. 

"So, what do you think of my new digs?"

Mona retracted her tongue and chuckled softly. "Well, you're in drastic need of the basics. Electricity, especially." He didn't say anything in response, just laughed and looked at her with a goofy expression on her face, so she smirked and returned to her carton. After a couple more licks, she realized that he was staring, and cocked her ears at him. 

He cocked his whole head at her. "Are you... scooping that with your  _tongue_?"

She quickly pulled her tongue back into her mouth, and swallowed the mouthful it brought with it. "Yes?"

For a beat he didn't say anything, but then he shifted so he could see her a little better. "Do it again." 

Mona felt awkward under his scrutiny, but she was amused at his bafflement, so she complied. She scooped a mouthful of sorbet easily with a graceful curl of her long tongue and pulled it into her mouth, while he watched in fascination. She just looked back at him after she swallowed, not really willing to be watched as she ate the whole thing, and he took the hint and sat back against the wall again. She saw him easily out of her peripheral vision as he stuck his tongue out as far as he could--not as far as hers, even relative to his shorter muzzle--and tried to mimic what she had done. She snorted in amusement as he failed; his tongue wasn't as strong or dextrous as hers, and he got little out with it. After a few licks, he gave up and returned to his previous method of sticking most of his muzzle into the cup and eating with many smaller, quicker licks that Mona could just barely discern by the sounds he was making and the movement of the dark shape of his head. Mona, amused, went back to hers. 

They finished in a few minutes and got up from the floor, Radko first and Mona a minute later. Radko set the carton on the counter away from the groceries--having no trash can yet--and stuck most of his head into the sink to wash off his muzzle. When Mona followed suit, he was sorting the groceries again, moving everything that was cold into a pile next to the fridge. With that done, he opened the freezer door and put all of the cold things in it, then promptly shut it again. Mona sorted the rest of the groceries for something to do so she wasn't just standing in the middle of the kitchen, putting the cans off to one side, the snacks in a pile, the fruit far from the edge where it was less likely to fall off and get damaged. She turned around when she heard Radko's rummaging cease, and looked at him in the darkness. She could barely make out his shape and the position of his ears; no other part of his face was visible enough to see an expression on it. 

"Thanks for coming over, it means a lot," he said quietly. 

Instead of a verbal answer, Mona stepped forward and pulled him into a hug. It was the first hug she had initiated, and she felt him twitch slightly when she touched him, but he quickly responded with enthusiasm. As they stepped back, he huffed a slight laugh. "I forgot you were wearing my jacket."

Mona laughed, half-embarrassed, and shrugged it off. She handed it back to him, and he took it and slung it over his shoulder. 

"It's late," Mona said, with no real idea of what time it was; their treat finished, she could think of no other reason to hang around his empty, dark apartment, and she felt that she would be over staying if she didn't go back. 

"Yeah, you probably want to be getting back home."

"Yeah."

They stood across from each other in the darkness for another second, and then Mona turned and walked to the door. She was glad that there was nothing on the floor and no furniture in the way, because even with her eyes adjusted, she could see little more than shapes. Radko followed more slowly, and spoke up as she got to the door. "I guess you'll be busy studying for the next few weeks."

She nodded, then realized that he might not be able to see it. "Yeah. Finals start in two weeks."

"Well, good luck. And if you need another brain break, hit me up."

"I will." She knew full well that she wasn't going to take him up on the offer until after finals. She had too much to cover and too little time in which to do it. "Don't get your hopes up too much, though. I will be busy."

"I understand, don't worry."

Another moment passed in the dark and the silence, and then Mona took a breath and said, "Well, see you soon, Radko."

"Seeya, Mona."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a lot of fun writing them eating sorbet out of cartons in the dark, I hope the attempt at atmosphere worked out okay :)


	20. In Which Radko is Domestic

The Thursday that she took her last final, Mona was heading back to her dorm when she spotted Radko sitting on a bench by the sidewalk that stretched alongside it. He was hard to miss; his mane was spiked up higher than she'd ever seen it, and he was wearing his bright orange work shirt. He was absorbed in his phone and pointedly ignoring the foot traffic passing him, so when Mona sat down beside him, he jumped. 

"Hi!" he exclaimed, clearly caught off guard. 

"You know, I was kinda wondering why you kept texting to ask me about the dates and times of my finals, and then changing the subject when I asked why."

He grinned his toothy grin. "I have something I'd like to show you."

"Oh? Where?"

"My place."

She gave him a droll look. "You came all the way here? You could have just asked me to come over."

He shrugged. "I got off work two hours ago and I didn't have anything better to do."

Mona checked her phone. "Well, lucky for you, you guessed correctly that I'm free this evening, but I need to go back up to my dorm first."

"Okay," he said agreeably, but didn't move when she got up. She turned to look at him. "You going to come with me?"

He blinked. "I'm allowed to?"

"It's not an all-female or an all-prey dorm, and curfew for having non-residents out isn't until ten."

"Okay, sure," he said, hopping up. 

They rode the elevator in silence with two other residents, a tapir and an orangutan, both of whom glanced suspiciously at Radko but didn't say anything. They got off at Mona's floor and she lead the way down the hallway. At her door, she dug her keys out of her pocket, and Radko shoved his paws into his as he inspected their door. Lilac had decorated it with two cardboard nameplates and several paper shapes--mostly flowers, some quite elaborate--and it was one of the flashier doors in the hall. 

"Did you do all this?" he asked quietly.

"Actually, I didn't do any of it. Lilac did."

"Your roommate?"

"Yeah." She got the door unlocked and lead the way in. Lilac was standing on her bed, packing clothes into her suitcase, and she looked up, saw Radko, and blinked. 

"Hi. Nice hair," she said, and turned to set down the shirt she'd been folding. 

Radko grinned. "Thanks."

"I'm surprised that your job lets you keep it that way," Mona remarked, taking her backpack off and going to set it down on her half of the long desk. Lilac's side was mostly cleared off already, but Mona was not leaving for break, so she'd just straightened her things. She had nothing to pack up, but it was a good time of year to clean up all the messes she had made while too busy studying to take care of her space.

"Yeah, they actually don't care about that kind of thing too much," he said, looking around. He seemed to decide that by by the door was a good place to be, and leaned against it nonchalantly. "They actually encourage gelling for mammals with long manes, so we don't get hairs in the food. It's this, or wear a dumb hat that sits funny on my ears."

"Don't they have hats that fit you?" Lilac asked, sitting down on the edge of her bed with her feetpaws hanging off the edge. 

"They have canine ones, but my head isn't quite shaped the same." Radko, now under Lilac's scrutiny, looked slightly uncomfortable.

Lilac tilted her head. "I don't mean to be rude, but... aren't hyenas canines?"

Radko shook his head. "Nah, we're weird. We look like canines--kinda--but we're more closely related to herpestids." Mona blinked, but didn't look up from unpacking her backpack. She'd never even heard of the word that had just come out of Radko's mouth. 

Lilac, however, clearly had. She made a short, excited honking noise, then said, "Wait, really?" She hopped down from the bed in one lithe motion that always made Mona's heart skip, though she did it all the time. She took a few steps closer to Radko, grinning, her round eyes fixed on his face. He looked even more uneasy than before.

"Yeah," he said, kicking at the floor with one footpaw and watching the motion instead of looking at her. "I'm surprised you even know what that is. Most mammals don't."

Lilac laughed, and Mona wondered at her behavior--until she spoke again. "Fossas are related to herpestids, too!"

Mona turned to look properly at both of them just in time to see Radko's eyes snap back up. He still looked uneasy, but moreso intrigued. 

"That makes us species cousins," Lilac said, her long tail flicking excitedly. 

Radko grinned and let out a tiny laugh, but Mona could see that Lilac's attention was still making him uneasy. Looking for an out that she could give him, she latched onto the first thing that popped into her head. "Hey, Radko. You still have my duffel bag, right?"

His expression went from startled to relieved, and then he schooled it into relaxation. "Yeah, it's at my place. Did you want to pick it up today?"

"If you're done with it, sure."

"Yeah, no problem."

Lilac glanced up at their wall clock and snorted lightly, then hurried quickly back to the ladder to her bed and flowed up it. "I hate packing," she grumbled, but didn't look at either of them as she said it, and so neither of them responded. 

Two minutes later, Mona and Radko bid Lilac goodbye and left. Mona had thrown on a jacket, having remembered her chill last time. 

"You're gonna make that face at me for saying this," Radko said suddenly in the elevator where they were alone, "but I've never met a predator before with lemur eyes."

Mona looked at him, baffled, and he huffed out a laugh. "Yeah, that face."

"Lemur eyes?"

"You remember that stare I was talking about when I first met Gezki? Lilac has that."

Mona snorted.  _"Lemur eyes,"_  she repeated to herself, laughing. "Is that why you looked so uncomfortable?"

"I was trying to hide it," he murmured as they got off the elevator. There were no other mammals around, so Mona said, "I don't think that she noticed. Lilac isn't really great at reading people, and I've gotten used to your tells."

He looked a little relieved at that, but didn't respond.

 

 

Mona made a couple of attempts to figure out what they were going to see on the train ride there, but Radko was tight-muzzled about it, and she soon gave up. The train was crowded with the traffic of nine-to-five mammals going home, and they ended up sharing a seat intended for very large mammals in silence, neither really feeling like talking in an environment where their conversation had no semblance of privacy. 

Mona braced herself as Radko unlocked his door, but nothing surprising came popping out at them, so she relaxed. Radko stepped inside and flicked the light on, then stepped aside, and as Mona stepped in, she realized what he was showing her.

The living room, once bare, now held a couch against the wall to her right and a cabinet to her left, next to the bedroom door. There was an old laptop on the couch, and a small trash can in the kitchen near the door to the bathroom. He gave her a second to look around, then stepped around the cabinet and opened the bedroom door. She moved up beside him and saw a mattress on the floor and a small dresser by one wall. All of his new things were definitely someone else's old things--they all had obvious signs of wear, and the dresser, made of particle board, had definitely suffered some water damage in the past--but they were furnishings nonetheless. His apartment now looked like someone lived in it. 

"Nice," she said, turning to him with a smile. "Where'd you get all of this?"

He grinned. "I was telling some of my work friends about my new place right after I got it, and a week later, a bunch of them show up at my door with stuff. Turns out, someone--they won't tell me who--organized them, and they brought some old stuff that they had around. I think they may have gone to a thrift store or two, though, because there was a pretty recent sticker still on the back of the cabinet in the living room."

Mona beamed. "That's so nice of them!"

Radko looked bashful. "Yeah, it's the difference between a shelter and a home, I guess."

Just as Radko was finishing his sentence, Mona's stomach growled. His ears pricked, and he looked down at her stomach and laughed. "Hungry?"

She nodded, making a face. "I only ate a snack this morning so I could last-minute cram for my final instead." She stepped back out into the living room, glanced around, and went to the cupboards. She had to open three before she figured out where he was keeping his cups, and found three worn-looking plastic cups on a bottom shelf. She plucked one out, glanced over it for cleanliness--not that she could look all that closely without her glasses--and then filled it half-full with tap water and drank. The water did nothing to lessen her hunger, but she had not drank anything either since that snack. She turned back towards Radko, who was sitting on the couch, and said, "Is there anywhere good for prey to eat around here?"

He smiled. "I'm sure we could find somewhere, but, uh," He paused for a moment to scratch one ear, "I bought some stuff last time I went shopping that you might like?"

"Really?"

"Yeah, feel free to check the fridge and freezer. If nothing appeals to you, we can go somewhere. I just thought you might like to look."

"Of course." She set her cup on the counter and turned to check the fridge. To her surprise, it contained some carrots, broccoli, and a salad mix that had several kinds of tasty bush leaves, and the freezer had a bag of frozen veggie burger patties and some fruit-filled pastries that were made with grain flour. 

"Are you going omnivore?" she asked jokingly, pulling out the bag of veggie patties and closing the fridge. 

"Nah, but I have a few work friends who are prey, and I wanted to have some food around so I can invite them over. Besides, I figured I'd be inviting you over now and then, and I thought you'd appreciate it."

Mona blinked. He'd been looking at her as he spoke, until the word 'besides', when he had suddenly started studying his claws intently. She smiled. "Of course I appreciate it," she said, and turned to the stove. On that back burners sat a single cast iron pan with the handle broken off and a single dented pot, both of which looked functional enough. She set the bag down on the counter, and Radko suddenly sprang up, looking embarrassed at having forgotten his manners.

"I'll fix it for you," he said quickly, "You can sit down and relax. I'm sure you need it, after all those tests."

Mona thought about objecting, but then decided not to. He was right, she was eager to sit down and do nothing. Besides, it was his kitchen, and she didn't know where he kept anything or what he even had available. She returned to the couch and sat. It had seen better days, and there was a brown stain--Mona hoped it was from coffee, but at least it had no smell--but it was still comfortable.

"Would you like one or two? Feel free to use the laptop for Zootube or something, if you'd like."

"Just one, thank you." Without much else to do, she pulled the laptop into her lap and opened it. It took a couple of minutes to boot, and then presented her with a login screen.

"Oh, you need to type the password," she said, not wanting to invade his privacy by asking for it. 

"Oh, it's uh," he hesitated, looking embarrassed again, "skatelyfe24, with a Y, no caps or spaces."

Mona, not sure she understood correctly, spelled her best guess out loud as she typed it in. "That's the one," he said, and turned back to the stove. He'd taken out a bottle of worcestershire sauce and sprinkled a little on the patty, which he had sitting on a paper towel on the counter while he waited for the pan to heat up.

Mona had made her way to Zootube and was just trying to decide what to listen to when Radko swore. She looked up to see him peering into a high cupboard, his ears back. He reached up and pulled down a loaf of bread with a sigh, facing her with it in paw.

"I forgot that I don't have... actual burger buns. And the only bread I have is made with insect flour."

Mona flicked her ears. "That's fine, I can eat it on that. I've had insect flour bread before, it tastes pretty good."

His ears perked up. "Really? I was worried I would have to run to the store. You like insect bread?"

She shrugged. "I wouldn't go out of my way to eat it, but yeah, I like it well enough."

He grinned and set the loaf down. "Awesome. Is there anything else you like on your burgers? I don't have much around here, but..."

"I like salad greens."

He flicked an ear, thinking. "On the burger?"

"Yep."

"Just like, a pawful?"

She glanced at his paws to judge the size of them. "That sounds perfect."

"Okay, will do."

They each returned to their tasks--Mona found some music videos to play quietly, and Radko chased the patty around the pan with a fork. Mona sat back and watched him idly out of her peripheral vision, her eyes turned towards nothing in particular so that she wouldn't give him the uncomfortable feeling of being watched. He was calm and relaxed, and seemed confident in what he was doing, and Mona realized, lazily, that she was happy to see him looking happy. It wasn't the kind of hyperactive joy that she had seen on him in short bursts. This was the first time she had seen him looking quietly content as a whole. 

"Mona?"

Mona blinked, and realized that she had dozed. Radko was standing in front of her with a burger on a plate, looking confused and a little concerned. 

"Hi. Thanks." She reached out and took the plate, and he sat down on the couch next to her. "I must have dozed off."

He tilted his head. "Your eyes weren't completely closed." He seemed unnerved.

"Yeah, that's normal for okapis when we nap. Especially accidentally." She set the plate on her lap and carefully gathered the burger into her hands. It had a generous handful of greens on it, and the patty was just toasted enough to be a little browned without being charred. 

He shook his head and laughed. "I learn something new about somebody else's species every day," he remarked cheerfully, and gently recaptured the laptop from where it sat between them on the couch. The short playlist that Mona had selected was over. He clicked and tapped at it for a minute while Mona tried her burger. It wasn't the most fantastic veggie burger she'd ever eaten, but it tasted good; even better because she was hungry.

"Aren't you going to eat anything?"

He shrugged and shook his head. "I ate after work."

Mona hesitated to ask her next question, but then cautiously spoke up. "Are you... eating better than you were before?"

He looked up, his expression conflicted. "Yeah, I'm eating almost every day now."

"Almost?"

He shrugged, his eyes back on his laptop. "On my days off, if I don't do anything, I don't really use much energy. Sometimes I don't eat. But it's because I'm not hungry, not because I can't."

Satisfied with that answer, she returned to her burger. After swallowing another bite, she commented, "Sorry if I seem naggy. I'm still not used to thinking in terms of predator metabolisms."

At that, his conflicted expression cleared and he smiled. "I understand. Thanks for looking out for me." He reached over towards her, almost aborted the gesture, and then patted her knee awkwardly before quickly withdrawing his paw again. Mona flashed him a brief smile and then returned to her food, realizing that he was a little embarrassed and not wanting to make him feel any worse. 

After a moment, Radko started doing something on his laptop again. "So, you wanna watch a movie?"

"Sure, that sounds great."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did some quick addition today, and I'm almost 20,000 words further in writing this than I am in posting it! Holy cow, it's gotten long! And they still haven't kissed yet (in either version)!


	21. In Which They Get Ready For A Party

Mona twisted in front of the mirror, flicking her tail in apprehension. "Are you sure I look okay?"

Radko and Gezki both tried to speak at once, stopped, looked at each other, and Radko gestured for Gezki to go ahead. Gezki looked back at Mona, hopped up from her perch on the back of the couch, and strode over. "You look just fine."

"This barely feels like a dress. I might as well be wearing jeans. I don't know whether I feel overdressed or underdressed." She grabbed the fabric of her knee-length denim dress and flapped it for emphasis, then turned around to look at both of them. 

Radko looked like he was about to say something, but this time Gezki beat him to it. "You look adorable, don't worry."

"It  _did_  say mostly casual," Radko added. "And Gez is right. The dress is cute, but you still look casual."

" _You're_  more dressed up than I am," she grumbled, more for the sake of objecting than because she really minded. 

He shrugged. "I'm not  _that_  dressed up."

Mona wanted to say _'you're as dressed up as I've ever seen you,'_ but she kept her mouth closed. Radko was dressed in the same outfit he'd worn to his interview months ago, and she had never seen him in it since the day they bought it for him. She suspected that he'd kept it in his closet all that time. He didn't seem the type to dress up without a good reason. 

Radko was looking at her as though he could see her thoughts moving, his eyebrows raised in expectation of her saying something. She just smoothed the fabric she'd grabbed and schooled her expression. There was no point in picking squabbles with him over something so silly. 

"I guess I'm ready, then," she said, checking the one tiny pocket at the dress's waist to make sure that her keys were safely in it and the button was done. She stepped away from the mirror, closer to the door, and turned to look at Gezki as Radko moved over next to her. 

Gezki, a twinkle in her eyes, clapped her paws to her cheeks. "Jus' lookit my lil baby," she said, throwing a very fake accent on and drawling as hard as she could. "Off on her very first date."

Mona, standing conveniently by the back of the couch, grabbed a pillow from it and hurled it at Gezki as hard and fast as she could. Gezki, too busy performing to react in time, took it right to the chest and toppled over backwards with a loud squawk like an airhorn. Hooting excitedly, she scrabbled for purchase on the pillow and hurled it back at Mona with all her might, but Mona anticipated the throw and sidestepped behind Radko. He tried to catch it, but mostly managed to grab it just as it was hitting him in the face, grunting and stepping backwards onto Mona's foot. She grabbed the pillow from him, paused just long enough to make sure he wasn't going to fall over when she pulled her foot out from under his, and then went after Gezki with the pillow. Gezki, realizing she was under fire, vaulted over the couch and scrambled for the stairs to her loft, cackling and shrieking and honking the whole way. Mona was faintly aware of Radko's howling, yipping laugh in the background as she skidded around the couch in pursuit. Gezki was, of course, long gone up the stairs by the time Mona got to the bottom of them, and she knew better than to try to chase her up them even if she wasn't wearing a dress--the ceiling was lower up there and the space was cramped. She pitched the pillow up the stairs and whirled around, enjoying the way the dress's simple skirt flared slightly. She quickly breezed past Radko, snickering where she'd left him, on the way to the door, and he caught up as she stopped to open it. 

"You kids have fun!" Gezki called from somewhere out of view in her loft.

"We will!" Mona called back, all chagrin from the moment before gone. She held the door for Radko, who was still trying to stop his laughter, and then ducked through it and shut it decisively behind them.

"Lookit my lil baby," Radko mimicked, and the cackled when Mona swatted him on the shoulder. "Ow! I'm done, I'm done." Still, he grinned mirthfully at her as they headed for the stairs. "She says the damndest things sometimes," he commented as he took the lead down them.

"She was joking," Mona felt the need to clarify, "She doesn't think we're on a date."

"Yeah, I figured as much."

Mona thought about telling him about the time that Gezki had told her to 'call if you snort too many pots and blackout', but then realized that she'd have to explain the context of the conversation, and decided that she wasn't comfortable telling him hers and Gezki's first impressions of him yet. Maybe not ever. They hadn't exactly spoken kindly of him at times.

"Thanks for coming with me."

Mona broke out of her thoughts and looked down at him. He was going down the stairs blindly in favor of grinning sheepishly over his shoulder at her until he stumbled and turned his face toward his paws again. "You know you've said that about six times, right?"

He snorted. "I didn't know you were  _counting_."

She snorted back. "Why'd you ask me in particular, anyway? I thought these are your friends from work?"

He shrugged. "One of them is, but honestly I don't know the guy very well at all. All my work buddies who I actually hang out with either couldn't come or just plain declined, but I'd already accepted, and I didn't want to look like an asshole by backing out. But he did explicitly say that we're welcome to bring a plus one, so." He gestured at her. "Moral support."

She thought about that in silence for a moment. "I've never been to a bachelor party before," she commented, and then waited until he opened his mouth to quickly add, "Since, you know, they're usually a strictly male thing."

He looked baffled for a second until he caught her teasing tone, and then he halted on the stairs so quickly that, at her brisk pace, she was forced to run into him. Even though he'd braced himself with a paw on the rail he still stumbled a step down, laughing as she snorted again. "Yeah, well, bachelor parties don't usually include both fiancées, and they usually have a lot of alcohol, but..."

"Okay, point. It is pretty unorthodox."

They continued to descend in silence, and began the half mile walk to the nearest train station. 

"So if his fiancée is there, why are they calling it a bachelor party at all? Wouldn't it be a combination bachelor and bachelorette?"

Radko frowned, and didn't answer for an uncomfortable enough amount of time that Mona nudged him and said, "What?"

"Mona, you've  _met_ Craig and Eric, remember? Eric's the pronghorn I work with?"

At the mention of his species, Mona suddenly  _did_ remember. A group trip to a restaurant, a pronghorn from their group meeting a bighorn sheep there, giving him a kiss, and then introducing him to the group with a sort of defiance in his eyes that dared them to say something. Mona hadn't, of course. She had no problems with interspecies couples, and she didn't know the group well anyway, so she'd just hung back off to the side in silence for most of the meal. 

"Shit," she said quietly. "Yeah, I do remember, sorry."

Radko stopped on the sidewalk and looked her in the eyes. "Are you--do you have a problem with this?"

"Of course not!" she exclaimed a little too loudly. He gave her a look, and she quickly lowered her voice. "I just forgot who they were, that's all." Her ears were laced back to hide her embarrassment, though not very successfully. 

The anger left Radko's expression, but he still looked troubled as he dropped her gaze and they kept walking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A short one this time, but I felt like splitting up this and the next one, which I'll try to post sooner rather than later!


	22. In Which They Attend a Party

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHOOPS, I appear to have fallen off the face of the earth a little. Sorry about that! It's now the last week of the semester for me, so everything has been a little crazy around here...

They didn't talk much for the rest of the trip. The train they took out to the meadowlands was mostly empty and mostly silent, and somehow that made conversation seem even less attractive than a full train did. Mona made a comment on the scenery once or twice, but Radko gave short answers and didn't seem very inclined to talk, so she let the silence reign after that. 

They disembarked at the Meadowlands' central station, and Mona immediately regretted her dress. There was a little snow on the ground, no more than two inches, and the temperature was only barely freezing according to her phone, but she was unused to any cold and not dressed for the weather. She immediately wrapped her arms around herself and wished she could pull her tail under her skirt without being completely awkward. Radko didn't look as bothered as she felt, but he still looked cold. 

"C'mon, he said quickly, "Taxis are this way."

Mona spotted the same sign he was looking at, and hastened after him. There were a couple of taxis parked on the edge of the street that bordered the station, and space for three more. Radko hastened over to one, and the driver flicked the light on his sign to indicate that he was available. Radko opened the door for Mona, and she slid across the seat inside to let him sit as well. The taxi, as most were, was big enough to hold an elephant, and they had ample room.

"Where to?" the driver asked.

Radko gave the name of the place--Mona blinked when he said the name of a casino, and she silently berated herself for not asking for more information before she agreed to come. The driver pulled out onto the street smoothly. It was just after two-thirty in the afternoon, and there was little traffic. 

They didn't talk in the taxi either, but the ride was blissfully short and the interior comfortably warm, so Mona just enjoyed the break from the cold outside. 

Radko paid the fare when they arrived, and Mona waited until the transaction was over to open the door, wanting to delay stepping into the cold for as long as possible. When she finally did, she held the door for Radko and quickly shut it behind him, and then they both booked it for the door of the casino.

Inside, Mona stamped a little clump of snow off of one of her hooves and Radko shuffled his paws on the mat just inside the door. Mona was glad that here, too, it was pretty warm, though not quite as warm as she was used to. She looked around curiously, never having been in a casino before, but since they'd come in a side entrance, they were just in a fairly unremarkable hallway.

"I'm glad to be out of the snow. Are we staying indoors?"

"As far as I know."

They headed down the hall and quickly found themselves just inside the main entrance, where a female gemsbok in fancy, but professional attire greeted them. 

"Anything I can help you find?"

"We're here for Eric and Craig's party."

"Of course! The buffet and dining hall is just across the lobby to your right. There's a big sign above the double doors, you can't miss it. Have a good time!"

Radko smiled at her and turned to follow her directions, but Mona turned away more slowly, and as she did, she caught a glimpse of the attendant's polite, cheery expression dropping off of her face with a tiny, barely audible snort. Just before she turned too far away to see, Mona caught her disgusted expression. 

Perplexed, she followed Radko automatically as she tried to figure out what the attendant's problem was. Radko was freshly bathed and had even spritzed himself lightly with some cheap cologne, so it couldn't have been his smell. 

Then it hit her. They were going to an event held in honor of an interspecies couple, and could even be mistaken for an interspecies couple themselves. That could also explain the look they had also gotten from a sheep on the train. Mona was glad that Radko didn't seem to have seen that look either, and she contemplated mentioning it to him, but by the time her thoughts got to that point, they were already at the dining room doors. 

Radko held the door for her in a casual way, stretching his arm out behind him as much as he reasonably could until she was almost through, and then they walked together into the dining hall. 

The first thing Mona noticed when she walked in was the aroma. The room was filled with a great many smells, some of them delicious, some of them smelling of cooked grubs, but in a hearty, seasoned sort of way that Mona guessed would be delicious if she ate such things. She was correct, if Radko's twitching nose was anything to go by. To their left was the buffet area, from which the smells were mostly coming, and to their right was a large dining area with tables and booths of a large variety of sizes and heights. Under the smell of food was the smell of many mammals of a variety of species. A little less than half of the tables were occupied. 

Mona wasn't sure where to go, but Radko, still sniffing audibly, turned towards the sea of tables and started winding his way through them. Mona followed, and after they passed a dozen tables she spotted their destination, in a section dominated by mid-scale tables and chairs. Several tables had been moved together to form one really long table, and about fifteen mammals were sitting at it, a few of them already eating. In the middle of the table, a bighorn ram and a pronghorn buck sat across from each other, holding hooves across the table, deep in conversation with two of their guests. 

"Hi guys," Radko said a little shyly, and the four immediately turned to look at him and Mona. 

The pronghorn's--Eric's--face lit up, and he exclaimed, "Radko! So glad you could make it!" He turned to look at Mona and his face became thoughtful. "So glad to see you too, dear. I know I've seen your face, but I'm afraid I don't remember your name."

"That's quite alright, I'm Mona." She offered a hoof to both him and the ram, and they each shook it. "Eric and Craig, right?" She said, looking at each in turn. They nodded, and Craig beamed at her. "Congratulations, both of you."

"Thank you so much, Mona," Craig said, his grin not budging a bit. "You two feel free to sit anywhere you like." He quickly grabbed two strips of paper--wristbands, Mona realized--from a pile on the table next to him and handed one to each of them. "Our party's all paid for in advance, so as long as you're wearing that, you'll eat for free. You can go now if you're hungry, or wait for everyone to arrive--we don't mind at all either way. This whole thing is totally casual."

Mona and Radko both thanked him, and took their wristbands several seats down the table. Radko put his on with a little difficulty, but Mona found hers slipping from her fingers every time she got close to snapping it into place, so after a moment, Radko took her wrist and helped her with it. 

Wristbands secured, they looked at each other and decided, without words, to go get something to eat immediately. They threaded their way back through the tables, Radko once more in the lead, and silently split up once they reached the buffet area. 

Mona returned to the table several minutes later, a rather large plate heaped with as many kinds of tasty vegetables and forages as she could fit on it. She knew that the plateful would take her quite some time to eat--her stomach simply not evolved to eat a large quantity of food in a short time--but since they would be here for a few hours, at Radko's estimate, she guessed that she would have time to pick at her plate until it was empty. Radko, with a plate almost as large and piled almost as high with his foods of choice, was already sitting down, though he wasn't eating just yet. 

"I forgot to grab something to drink while I was over there," he said sheepishly, standing up just as she sat down. "Would you like me to grab you something?"

Mona blinked, realizing that she hadn't thought to get a drink either. "That would be nice. Just water, but in the largest sized cup you think I can manage without much trouble?"

He grinned. "Sure thing. Be right back."

While she waited for him to return, she started nibbling at whatever had ended up on the top of her plate--some spinach-based salad that she had drizzled lightly with a subtle dressing. It was delicious, but she was in no hurry, and so she had only just finished chewing one bite by the time Radko returned. 

Since her back was to the buffet area, she didn't see him approach, but she heard him and glanced to her right to thank him--only to see him grinning cheekily around what had to be the largest cup he could find, full almost to the brim with ice water. He set it down gingerly next to her plate, and just as she was about to ask how he expected her to drink from it, he plopped an equally large straw in a paper wrapper down next to it. 

"I know it's too big, but I thought with the straw, you wouldn't have to pick it up." His words almost made him sound sorry, except for the mischievous grin on his face. Mona snorted but then laughed and unwrapped her straw. "Cheeky, but not incorrect," she remarked, making him laugh, and took a sip. Her neck was just long enough to make drinking from the straw comfortable without having to move the cup closer. 

As more and more guests arrived, they found themselves left comfortably alone. Other mammals took seats near them, and they exchanged some words with each. Two of Radko's other coworkers arrived, and each greeted him in particular, but then settled into seats elsewhere and conversed with other mammals. 

Mona, happily, didn't find the whole experience as uncomfortable as she had expected to. She had felt awkward in her dress when they left Gezki's place, worried simultaneously that all the other mammals would be dressed either more formally or more casually. She was glad to see that neither was true. Craig and Eric were both dressed in suits--Eric's was forest green and made of iridescent material, and Craig's was made of matte light blue fabric, and each's shirt matched the other's coat and slacks--but all of their guests that had arrived so far were dressed not too differently than Mona and Radko were. She would have thought that not really being talked to by anyone else would be uncomfortable, but Radko, other than greeting his coworkers, was in a similar position. They talked idly between themselves, commenting on the food and the other guests and the sights around them. Neither was used to being somewhere as fancy as the casino, but some of the other diners around them were dressed like everyday mammals, and Mona guessed that they had come just for the food. As she tried more of the things on her plate, she decided that she might have to come back some time in the future just for the food. Though none of it was extremely fancy, it was all quite delicious, and there was such an abundance and variety available that she doubted any mammal could leave hungry. 

"Here, I know it's not exactly your kind of food, but you have to try this," Radko said suddenly, nudging her arm and picking up something off of his plate. It appeared to be a mushroom, grilled with some sort of finely chopped mixture inside. It smelled strongly of herbs with a hint of insect protein, and she eyed it curiously, if a little warily. 

"It's made with ground beetle grubs," he elaborated, seeing her expression. "It doesn't really taste like them, though. It's delicious. Here." He held it up, towards her face, in a way that clearly suggested that he was trying to offer it directly into her mouth. She sniffed it cautiously at closer range, and considered taking it with her hoof instead. The idea of eating from his paw was uncomfortable enough to make her hesitate, but ultimately not enough to refuse. She extended her neck and delicately took it onto her tongue, biting down cautiously. As he'd said, it didn't really taste much like grubs. The flavor was dominated by the taste of the mushroom and the herbs, but rich and nutty, and just oily enough to be delicious without being too greasy. She chewed slowly, deciding that the flavor was weird but enjoyable. As she swallowed, she focused once more on Radko, and he blinked and lowered his paw suddenly, having left it hanging in the air while she chewed. He cleared his throat and put his paws in his lap, suddenly looking at his plate with an unusual intensity. 

"So, did you like it?" he asked without looking up. 

"It was quite good," she assured. "Perhaps if I go back for another plateful I will get another one or two."

"You can have some of mine," he offered quickly, gesturing to them but still not looking at her. She noticed two more little mushrooms, perched precariously on the edge of his plate. 

"No, it's quite alright," she said. "I'll have to see how all of this food settles before I know for sure whether I want more."

He grunted an understanding and picked up his fork again, and Mona returned to her plate as well. As she swallowed another bite of one of her many salad mixes and extended her neck again to take a sip of her water, she noticed Radko unsubtly watching her from behind a forkful of food, which seemed to have stalled on its path to his mouth. She turned an ear towards him, then her face, and said, "What? Do I have food on my muzzle?"

"Er. no, you're fine," he said quickly, once again staring at his plate with an odd intensity, his ears pointing the same way his muzzle was as though he was forcing them to stay there. Mona didn't look away right away, suddenly concerned. "Are you okay?" she asked, dropping her tone down very quietly so that nobody else was likely to hear. 

He pinned his ears, then turned the nearest one towards her again. "What? Me? I'm fine." He gave a tiny laugh, clearly flustered, and Mona was even more convinced than before that he was not. 

"You're staring at your plate pretty hard," she pointed out, voice almost a whisper so that no other mammal would hear. "Have you been eating okay lately?"

At that, he seemed to relax slightly, which struck Mona as odd. He usually tensed up when she asked him questions about how well he was eating. "Yeah, totally fine. I'm just, uh, kind of amazed. This is a lot of food, and it's all good. It makes me wonder how much those two had to pay to cover the meal for all of us." At that he quickly picked up his fork and stuck a bite of something in his mouth, his motions hurried as though he was anxious to be eating. Though Mona didn't think he was lying, she was almost certain that he was deflecting, coming up with some excuse to avoid saying what he was really thinking. Still, he didn't seem actually distressed, and if he wanted to avoid her prying, she wouldn't force him to talk. 

"Yeah," she said, going along with his attempt to change the subject, "I was actually just thinking that it would be nice to eat here again some day. It's quite good. I would definitely want to look up the prices first, though, just in case."

Radko relaxed the rest of the way, and Mona decided that she'd been right to let it go. Curious as she was, she would lose more than she gained if she forced information out of him and made him begrudge her for it. "Definitely," he said agreeably, and poked at the things on his plate until he could cleanly spear a piece of fried shrimp. "Say," he said looking at her, "Have you ever tried seafood?" He popped the shrimp in his mouth.

"No." Guessing from the look on his face that he was about to suggest she try some, she quickly added, "I would be willing to try it sometime, but not here. The smell is iffy to me, and I wouldn't want to take a bite of something and immediately spit it back out when eating in public."

He nodded, clearly trying not to laugh. "I get that, definitely. Maybe I'll invite you over sometime when I'm having something fishy to eat." 

"I'd take you up on that." 

Radko's face suddenly got pensive. "Eating fish wouldn't... make you sick, would it?"

Mona shook her head immediately. "Unless I have an allergy I don't know about, no. Most prey can eat predator food now and then with no problems, as long as we're still getting our regular nutrition as well."

"I guess I shouldn't be that surprised, it's not like I don't see the occasional prey mammal in the insect isles in the store," he remarked. 

Mona nodded. "Some like it. I remember learning in my basic biology course last year that before we evolved, prey animals would sometimes eat meat if they came across it."

He almost choked on his food. "Wait, really?"

She nodded. It was a gristly topic to be talking about at a dinner table, but they had both kept their voices low and she wasn't squeamish, so she carried on. "Nowadays, with all the commercially available food, we don't have to worry about nutrition, but back when we were all foraging... grasses and bushes didn't always have quite enough protein. Or other nutrients." She barely remembered the lesson, but the basics of it seemed enough. "So, I guess a little snack now and then made sense."

Radko still seemed flabbergasted. " _A little snack_ ," he quoted, shaking his head. Mona couldn't help but laugh at his expression. "I knew predators were cannibals back then," he said, his tone a little... ashamed? "But I never thought prey were, too." He seemed lost in thought.

"I've been learning that a lot of things aren't as they were taught when we were calves. College tries to teach more of how the world really is. It's a lot darker than I thought."

He shook his head, not to deny what she was saying, but in consternation. "The amount of shit the other cubs gave me, growing up, about being a predator," he said pensively. "I got called a cannibal a few times. And a lot of words that meant about the same thing."

Mona put a hoof on his shoulder, and that seemed to snap him out of his thoughts. He gave a soft sigh, and a sad sort of chuckle. "Nevermind that, though," he said quickly, poking at his plate once more. "I'm doing much better now."

Mona gave his shoulder a slight squeeze. "It can still be good to talk about things like that."

He shrugged. "I guess, but this really isn't the place." He reached up to pat her hoof in thanks, and then she gently returned it to her lap. She knew that he was right, so when he tucked back into his food and offered nothing else, she tucked the information away in her brain. She doubted that she would bring it up herself later--she was not one to stir someone else's old traumas uninvited--but she would keep it in mind, safe alongside all the other things she had slowly learned about Radko's life. 

As she slowly ate her way through the pate of food, she quietly observed Radko out of the corner of her eye. She mentally compared the hyena sitting beside her to the hyena that had sat down across from her all those months ago at the Jackal and Lynx, and was hit with a sudden wave of pride in how far he'd come and gladness that she had been along to see the change. He made an idle comment to her about a light fixture, and grinned softly in response to her smile. In that moment, she was suddenly glad that she'd agreed to come along, and glad that she had pushed her way back into his life after their summer had ended, and glad that she would be around for whatever came next.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My chapter titles just keep getting lamer :D
> 
> Also, we can't see Radko's thoughts in this version of them, but this is when he figures it out. This is when the crush starts properly!
> 
> Mona, of course, is still down the street and around the corner. She has a ways to go, yet.


	23. In Which They Cook Some Food

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I felt bad for taking so long to post the last chapter, so I thought I'd go ahead and post another now :)

Radko stopped and dramatically spread his arms, gesturing at the isle before them. "Here we go," he said, "Pick your poison."

Mona gave him a droll look. "You know it doesn't make it sound appealing if you call it poison, right?"

He just shoved her forward with a firm paw in the middle of her back. "Go on, you agreed to this, now humor me."

Snorting in amusement, Mona complied. She stepped forward into the grocery isle, Radko close behind, and started scanning the freezers. Thirty seconds in, though, she gave up and turned to Radko. "I've never had any of this. What do you think I would like?"

He tapped on his chin pensively. "Well, would you prefer a strong flavor or a blander one?"

She took a moment to think before answering. "I guess blander? We can work up to a strong one if I like it."

"Solid plan." He started scanning the packages of fish, then pointed towards a row. "Tilapia might be good. It tends to taste like whatever it's cooked with. Most of the shellfish are more flavorful, so we'll skip them for now."

She shrugged. "Tilapia sounds fine, then."

"Cool." He opened the cooler and pulled out a package, which he dropped into the basket on his arm. "Okay. now we gotta go to the herbs and spices isle."

Mona followed without comment as he pulled out his phone and checked the list on it. He stopped in front of a literal wall of spices, moved a small rolling stepladder for the convenience of smaller mammals out of the way, and then started scanning for the things that were on his list. 

A few plastic jars of spices into the basket later, he turned towards Mona. "Okay, this is my portion. What veggies are we going for?"

Now it was Mona's turn to lead the way. She brought them to the produce area, and glanced around. She had a few things in mind, but she deicded to give Radko the same choice he'd given her. "Would you like to pick  _your_  poison?"

He laughed. "Nah, I don't really have a preference. I haven't tried many veggies."

"How do you feel about bitter things?"

He hesitated for a moment, then said carefully, "Maybe... not very much bitter?"

"You got it." She checked over the produce available, turning one or two things over to check them for quality, and then finally decided on a few different kinds of squash. Her vegetables chosen, she pulled out her phone and did a couple of searches, then put it away and said, "Do you have cooking oil?"

"Does olive oil work?"

"That's perfect, actually." She checked the spices he already had in the basket against the list in her head, confirmed that he had the one she was missing at home--parsley--and then declared her shopping done as well. 

The tapir who rang up their groceries gave them a funny look, which Mona caught, but Radko did not seem to. Their groceries properly bagged, they divided the load pretty evenly and headed for Radko's apartment. There weren't many sidewalks, but the area was mostly filled with small, neighborhood streets that saw only a little, slow-moving traffic, so they walked along the edges of the streets without worry.

"Did you see the look he gave us?" Radko said suddenly in the midst of a comfortable silence.

Mona had to take a moment to figure out what he was talking about. "The cashier?"

"Yeah." 

She snorted softly. "Yes."

He looked up at her, his expression troubled. "That's the second time I've noticed someone looking at us weird. At first I thought it was just, y'know, the sort of looks prey give predators sometimes. I thought it was directed at me. But the last one I'm talking about was like this one--no fear or wariness, just... disgust."

Mona didn't answer right away, but it didn't seem that he was expecting her to; he kept walking in silence, scuffing his paws occasionally in the tufts of grass at the edge of the road that leaned over the pavement, as she collected her thoughts. She'd seen the looks, but she'd hoped that Radko would remain ignorant of them. He'd had enough hardship in his life. 

"I think it's because... well, prey and predators being close friends is... unusual."

"Rare, even."

"Yeah. And prey and predators being roommates, or being..." she paused to choose the best word, not wanting to make the conversation any more awkward than it already was, "partners, is even more rare."

He pinned his ears, looking at her in confusion. "But we aren't..."

"Yeah, but I think that sometimes other mammals think we're together."

He let out a short, yipping laugh which ended as quickly as it had begun, as though he hadn't meant to let it out at all. "Really?"

"I've seen other mammals give us looks like that... at least half a dozen times. Maybe more. I wasn't counting."

His ears flicked forward, concern on his face, and he looked down, then back at her face. "Really? When?"

She shrugged and gave herself a moment to recall before she spoke again. "The last time we went shopping together, I saw someone look at us funny in the isles. I've seen one or two when we're on the train together. The door-greeter at the casino last month was... particularly unsubtle."

He laced his ears. "She was so friendly?"

"Her expression changed as soon as we turned around."

"How did you see it, then?"

She pointed to her eyes. "Even other prey animals often forget how much we can see."

He frowned. "What?"

"Peripheral vision. Most prey mammals' eyes are really good at seeing all around us. I can usually notice things, especially if they're moving, pretty far behind me. My mom--my biological mom--taught me how to practice using it, but I think that most mammals are... out of practice."

Seeming to understand what she meant, he transferred his bags to one paw, then raised his free one and held it up beside her ear. "Can you see this?"

Mona turned her face and her eyes forward. "Yes. It's a bit blurry over there, but I can tell it's your paw."

He moved it back a few inches. "Now?"

"Blurrier, but I can still see a brown shape."

He moved it further back, and Mona, trying to hide a smile, said, "Now you're out of my field of view."

He dropped his paw. "That's... crazy. So you can see your own ears?"

"Yes. As long as I don't have them pinned."

"I can't see mine, even if I hold them forward and turn my eyes." He demonstrated, and Mona couldn't help but laugh at the expression of wall-eyed concentration on his face. At her laughter he relaxed his eyes and ears and shoved her playfully with his free paw. 

They were silent for half a block, but then Radko emerged from his thoughts to say, "So mammals forget that you can see kinda behind you, and that's when they give us the looks?"

"Sometimes, yes. The ones who try to hide it, anyway."

He was silent for another minute, and then mumbled, "So that's why I've never been able to startle you."

Mona swiveled both ears towards him, surprised. "You've been trying?"

He looked a little embarrassed. "Yeah, sometimes. It's fun to kinda just show up at my friends' shoulders and make them jump. But I've never been able to do it to you."

She chuckled. "I never noticed you trying."

He snorted. "Yeah, because you saw me coming the whole way and I didn't realize it."

She shrugged. "Even if I don't see something coming, I also just don't startle easily."

" _Prey eyes_ ," he said in a good-natured grumble, and Mona laughed again.

 

 

In Radko's kitchen, they unbagged the groceries onto the counter, shoved all of the bags into a wad inside another bag under the sink, and set about finding the appropriate cooking dishes and dividing the counter space between them so that they could both work at the same time in Radko's small kitchen. Five minutes later, the microwave got removed to the floor so Mona could use the extra counter space to pile her chopped squash on. 

They worked quietly for a few minutes, each carefully reading instructions on their respective phones while preparing the food. Radko passed behind Mona to grab a utensil from a drawer near her, but then stopped on the way back and looked at her phone quizzically. 

"Do your prey eyes have something to do with why you keep the text size on your phone so huge?"

Mona snorted at his word choice. "I think you know how incorrect it would be to say that to anybody else, so I'm not even going to go there," she began, making him yip in laughter, "but yes, and no. A lot of ungulates don't have very good close vision, but my eyes are unusually bad. I keep the text size turned up pretty high so I don't have to put my glasses on any time I want to use my phone."

He just answered with a curious little "huh," and returned to what he was doing. 

Just as Mona was getting all of her squash pieces arranged in a casserole dish--one of many new dishes and utensils that Radko had acquired to properly stock his kitchen--Radko spoke up again, his voice quiet enough that she immediately stopped moving to make sure that she didn't miss anything.

"Does it bother you that other mammals sometimes think we're together?"

Blindsided by the question, she thought for a moment before shaking her head. "No. I don't care if small-minded mammals judge us to themselves based on an incorrect assumption. As long as they don't harass us, what does it really matter?"

He huffed a tiny laugh. "Yeah, you're right." Still, his expression was focused in that way that meant he was lost in thought, so Mona continued what she'd been doing a little more slowly and quietly, anticipating that he would say something else soon enough. 

She didn't have long to wait. "Do you think you would ever date a predator?" She looked up at him to gauge his tone and expression better than she could from her peripheral vision, and he quickly added. "I don't mean like, me, of course. Just, you know, some predator you might meet and hit it off with, in college or something?"

Mona returned to her task, covering the dish with foil, to think about her answer without having to do so under the pressure of his gaze. "I really don't know," she said finally. "I've never felt... close enough to any predator I've known to consider something like that."

"Have you ever dated outside of your species?"

She was about to answer no, but then recalled something and paused. "Not really," she said, and chuckled, "Unless you count a silly crush I had on a mouse deer when I was six."

He laughed as well, but still sounded a little embarrassed at having asked at all, so Mona decided to return his questions. "What about you, would you ever date a prey? Or some other predator?" She leaned over to check that the oven knob was in the right position for the preheat.

"Sure, as long as they're down with it. I almost dated a lion once, but he... got a lot less interested once I told him that I wasn't a bitch."

Mona blinked, not sure which part of the statement to process first. Radko saw her face and laughed. "Yeah, I'd swing either way, given a decent chance."

"I didn't mean to assume--"

"It's a little different," he said quickly, and she fell silent as he explained. "Some hyenas stick strictly to heterosexuality because that's 'the way it's supposed to be'," he said, making air quotes with his paws, "But a lot of us don't really care either way. It's not like it's all that different, with us."

Mona was baffled. "I don't think I understand."

Radko opened his mouth, but then shut it again and grimaced. "I'm sorry, but I don't know if I want to start a hyena sex ed lesson right now. Or ever. I'm definitely not the most qualified." He laughed briefly, then added, "Feel free to look it up if you want, though. Just, uh. Be warned. What's normal for us is... a little strange for most other mammals."

Mona, her apprehension warring with her curiosity, turned and grabbed her dish, put it in the oven, and then said, "That's... perfectly fine. I wouldn't want to try to give you an okapi sex ed lesson, either. I'll decide later if I want to know badly enough to actually look it up."

He barked out a laugh, made forceful and rough by awkwardness, and returned to his task, He oiled a skillet and flicked on the burner as Mona collected her phone, set a timer, and then went to the couch to sit. All she had left to do with her part of the meal was wait. 

Radko, apparently eager to change the subject, started telling her about something funny that had happened at work a few days previous, and she happily listened. She couldn't have guessed where his sudden questioning had come from or why he'd decided to ask even though he clearly found the conversation awkward, but she didn't begrudge him any of the answers she'd given, either. Though Gezki would always hold the place of best friend in her heart, she and Radko had grown closer than she would have guessed they would, and she couldn't deny that she found some things about him fascinating. She'd had predator friends now and then, but none close enough that she felt comfortable drawing attention to their differences. Radko, candid and frank as he was, had a lot of good-natured curiosity about him, and she was happy to humor it just as he humored her curiosity on the rare occasion she felt comfortable speaking it. 

Still, as interesting as it was to learn about his diet and what little of his culture he knew well enough to share, she valued his personality more. The closed-off, cynical mammal she had first met was almost entirely stripped away. His stubbornness had been born of experience and necessity, but she could see now that it was not his nature, and she was happy to see him comfortable enough to leave it behind. 

Story over, Radko fell silent again as he tended the pan with the fish in it. Mona thought about pulling out his laptop to find some music, but decided to leave it alone. She was content with the silence, broken only by the sizzle of frying fish. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter should be up before too long, as long as I don't forget to post it. I'm going to have baby chickens in the house in less than two weeks, so there's a chance I'll space on it! 
> 
> However, the chapter after THAT needs to be read over by my beta, who is being lazy and forgetful, so it will be up... whenever I poke him hard enough to make that happen. If I suddenly go inactive soon, it'll be for one of these two reasons.


	24. In Which They Eat Unusual Food

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guess who spaced because of tiny chickens! Me. It was me.
> 
> I now have ten tiny fluffballs in my room. That is more tiny fluffballs than I intended to get, but as soon as they're old enough that I can take a real good guess about their sexes, at least six of them are leaving! 
> 
> I have bantam silver-laced barnevelders and bantam partridge wyandottes, if anyone is curious. 
> 
> I haven't been writing pretty much at all since a week before finals started, but as of today I have all my tiny chickens acquired and I am gonna actually take my much-needed after-semester break! I'm gonna try to get my streak going again. Feel free to ask me, next time I update (or between now and then if you wish) how I'm doing on that!

When the timer on Mona's phone went off, she quickly grabbed Radko's potholders and retrieved the squash from the oven, setting it on the burner next to the one that Radko was using in order to let it cool. He prodded the fish one last time, then flicked the burner off. 

"Mine just needs to cool," Mona said quietly. 

"Yeah, mine too." He set the spatula down, turned to face her, and grinned. "Look at us cooking together, all domestic and shit."

She laughed, and he went to the fridge to rummage around. "What would you like to drink?"

"Do you still have that carrot juice from last time?"

"I think so." He dug further into the back, then announced a muffled "Ah-ha!" and emerged with it in paw. "I don't know if it's still okay?"

Mona took the jug from him, opened it, gave up on being able to see whether there was any mold on it, and sniffed it. "It smells fine. I'll drink it."

Radko got out two plates and set about putting the fish neatly onto them--the biggest one for her, the three smaller ones for him--and then passed each plate to her. She carefully scooped squash out with a big spoon, putting a pretty equal amount on each plate; the dish was still half full, but she had known when she started that there would be more than they would eat in a sitting. 

Radko grabbed silverware for them both and headed for the couch with his plate in his other paw. He emptied his paws onto his battered little coffee table--a recent addition to his small collection of furniture--and carefully pulled it closer to the couch as Mona came over to set down their drinks, went back to the kitchen, and then returned with her plate.

"How does it smell?" he asked as Mona collected a knife and fork from him and sat down with her plate in her lap. 

"Weird, but not bad weird. I'll save my judgements until I taste it. How does the squash smell?"

"Like a vegetable."

"Oh, really?" She gave him a dry look.

He shrugged. "It doesn't smell much. Is there any particular way I should eat it?"

"Don't eat the rind on the orange pieces. Well, you can if you want, but it's tougher and doesn't taste as good."

Each speared a piece of the other's food, and then immediately looked at the other. Mona set her fork down quickly. "You first."

Radko snorted, amused, and popped the piece of yellow squash into his mouth. He chewed pensively, but only three times before he swallowed. Unbidden, he gave his opinion. "It tastes pretty good. Better than most vegetables I've tried."

"I looked up instructions on specifically how to cook vegatables for predators. I seasoned it differently than I would have if cooking for myself."

His ears perked up. "Really? Thanks. I'll be honest, I probably wouldn't go out of my way to eat it, but I like it pretty well."

"The different colors taste a little different, so don't expect them all to be the same."

"Thanks for the warning." Without taking another bite, he set his fork down and turned to her. "Your turn."

A little trepedaciously, but refusing to show it, Mona picked her fork back up, the bite of fish still on it. She sniffed it. The herbs on it smelled nice, but she was still a little wary of the smell underneath. Still, she grabbed the bite neatly off of her fork with her tongue and closed her mouth around it, hoping for the best and trying not to be prepared for the worst. 

The taste was unlike anything else she had eaten before; she had expected it to taste like bug, but it didn't really compare. She mulled it around in her mouth slowly. It didn't really need much chewing, because it was thoroughly cooked and flaky enough to fall apart under the force of her tongue. After considering it for a moment, she swallowed. It was a little slimy going down, but not really unpleasantly so. 

"What do you think?"

She licked her muzzle. Her mouth felt sticky and weird, and she still wasn't quite sure how to feel about the taste. "I'm not sure," she said, and took another bite. This one, she smushed with her tongue and let the flavor fill her mouth. The tang of the herbs was pleasant, and after a moment she decided that the taste underneath was okay, but, much like Radko's assessment of her squash, nothing she would seek out. She swallowed. "I like the herbs. I don't think I'm a big fan of fish, but it's not bad."

He smiled softly. "Yeah, I don't blame you, the flavor is... different."

She shrugged and ate another bite. Again, when she swallowed, her mouth was left feeling sticky and strange. "It feels... gooey. Sticky."

He nodded. "Fish will do that to you. If it bothers you, and taking a drink doesn't make it go away, then you might want to rinse your mouth or brush your teeth when you're done eating."

She shrugged. "It's weird, but I was more worried it wasn't normal than anything." 

He tilted his head. "Wasn't... normal?"

"I was a little worried I might have a reaction to it."

"Oh." He looked suddenly very concerned, as though he had only just thought of that possibility. He gave a tiny laugh. "Well, no, that's normal. But if you start feeling weird at any point, let me know."

"Will do." She took a small drink of her carrot juice--thankfully it seemed to get rid of a lot of the stickiness--and then put a bite of squash in her mouth. She'd never tried the combination of herbs that she'd put on it, but she found it pleasant, if a little overpowering. 

"I like this," Radko said while chewing another bite, orange bits of squash visible between his teeth. "It goes well with the fish. Try them together?"

Mona obliged, but found the mixture of the two flavors less pleasant than they were on their own. "I think I'll stick with eating them separately."

Radko just laughed.

 

 

Their meal finished, Radko gathered the plates and gave each a quick wash, set them in his dish rack--another recent acquisition--and then returned to the couch. On his way by, he playfully grabbed Mona's ear and gave it a little tug and she, surprised, snapped her head back and yanked her ear out of his grip. He grinned playfully while Mona, feeling her personal space violated, tried to brush it off. She reminded herself that they were very different species and that he might not have the same personal space etiquette. Focused on her thoughts, she didn't see his paw coming until he grabbed her other ear, and again she startled and jerked it out of his paw, leaning away and watching him in case he decided to do it again. He was sitting rather closer than she wanted him, paws still up in preparation for another playful grab, and she put her hooves up to defend in case he went through with it. 

After a moment, apparently not seeing the encouragement he was looking for in her face, he put his paws down and looked away. "Want to watch something?" he asked, grabbing his laptop. 

Mona paused. "Actually, I... gotta go. I have homework I should be doing."

He sighed dramatically, slouching low on the couch. "Always with the homework, you."

"I  _am_  a college student."

He didn't seem sure how to respond to that, so after a beat he said, "Well, good luck with that."

"Yeah. Thanks." She gathered her phone from the coffee table, the only thing of hers she'd set down, and stood up. "The food was good, thanks."

"You too. We should do this again sometime." He turned to continue facing her as she headed for the door. 

"Sure, why not," she agreed, and offered a wan smile. "See you soon."

"Seeya, Mona."

She closed the door behind her quickly and got walking before she could take a moment to let herself think. It wouldn't do to make an excuse, leave, and then promptly stand around outside; Radko would surely notice. 

Gaze on the ground in front of her, Mona headed for the bus stop, shaking her head just hard enough to make her ears flop. She firmly told herself to settle down. The little bits of research that she'd done on hyenas over the time she'd known Radko had informed her that they were a pretty touchy species, being pack animals, but Mona was unused to being mammalhandled like he'd been doing lately, and the sudden conversation about dating outside of one's species had thoughts swirling through her head, unwilling to leave her alone even though she knew, logically, that they were unlikely. 

Radko was pawsy with a lot of his friends from work, especially a wolf named Brian, with whom she'd seen him roughhousing idly a lot. It was unlikely that his touchiness, teasing, and ear-grabbing had anything to do with the conversation they'd just had, but the coincidence wouldn't get itself out of Mona's head. 

Remembering his comments about hyena sexuality and things being weird with his species, Mona debated with herself for a moment before she resigned herself to her curiosity. She was nearly at the bus stop, so as she approached it, she checked the schedule on the sign. The bus should arrive in two minutes. She decided that patience was better, and stood next to the sign to wait. 

The bus ride was both blissfully short and annoyingly long, but she weathered it in silent determination. At the train station, she, again, checked the schedule, and sighed. The train that would take her home wasn't due for thirty minutes. 

Glad that it was a quiet period, she found a bench appropriately sized for her that put her back against a wall. She pulled out first her phone, then her glasses case. She put her glasses on, tapped a widget on her phone that disabled the accessibility mode she usually left on to make the text larger, and then, satisfied that no curious passerby could accidentally see what was on her screen, opened Zoogle. 

For a few moments, she stared at it, unsure what to search, mentally wandering back over their conversation. After a moment she settled on "hyena sexuality" and sent the search. 

The first link was an article entitled "Hyenas and Sexuality: Divided Views", which she tapped on promptly. She read quickly, her impatience to know making it difficult to keep herself from skipping ahead. The first few paragraphs of the article had no substance, their aim clearly to pique interest and keep the reader from leaving the page before the end of the article (and maybe fluff out space for more ads, she thought with an annoyed snort as she scrolled past one shoved in between paragraphs). Finally she got to some interesting information, one sentence of which particularly caught her eye: "Some argue that hyenas' unique view of sexuality is cultural, but some researchers believe that it's strongly tied to the unique anatomy of hyena bitches."

She scanned ahead. The rest of the article was about the divide in viewpoints among hyenas. As Radko had mentioned, there were two sides, one of which argued that homosexuality just wasn't "as nature intended", but there was a much larger percent of the hyena population than that of other mammals--the article quoted a statistic of 36%, as opposed to less than 5% in most other species--identified as pansexual or bisexual. The article went on to describe the views of those hyenas roughly as Radko had, but in more detail; the general consensus among them was that there was little enough difference between hyena bitches and dogs to make any other orientation make sense. 

Frustrated with the article's vagueness, Mona closed that page and opened Zoogle again. She hesitated for a moment, but then chided herself with the reminder that nobody else was going to be looking through her phone; she searched "hyena bitch anatomy" and tapped "images"

The first several images that popped up made her raise her eyebrows. There were two diagrams of uteruses, but the rest of the images at the top of the search were all full-body diagrams of male hyenas. Frowning in annoyance, she added the word "female" to her search and tried again. A few of the images were different this time, but some were the same; diagrams of male hyenas, with scientifically accurate penises dotting her phone screen. One, however, was an image of two penises and scrota, with tiny text pointing at different aspects of them, and with a resigned sigh, she relented to her curiosity she tapped it to make it bigger. 

She immediately blinked at the title of the image. "Anatomical Differences in Hyena Genitalia" was printed in neat letters across the top, and the left and right diagrams were labeled Male and Female, respectively. She blinked, read it again. She wasn't reading wrong. 

She scanned the differences noted in the diagram, then hit back on her phone until she ended up on the Zoogle homepage again. She repeated her last search, but this time didn't specify images, and soon ended up on a Wikipedia page about hyena anatomy. 

When the train arrived, she was in the middle of reading, fascinated and slightly horrified, about how birth worked for hyena bitches, and she almost didn't catch it in time. She scrambled to swipe her pass and get through the door before it closed, and found a seat with a huff of relief. The train was a little too crowded for her to want to risk continuing to read, even with the text size reduced, so she put her glasses back in their case and returned it to her pocket. Anyway, she had seen enough to understand Radko's remarks and what the first article had meant, and she resolved to go ahead and leave it at that. She reflected on what she'd learned, and unbidden, an image of what Radko might look like naked popped into her head, far too clinical and detailed, her imagination recently supplied with all the intimate details of what hyenas' bodies looked like. Shaking her head forcefully to dispel the image, she pulled out her phone to text Gezki, determined to get all of that out of her head. 


	25. In Which Mona Does Not Expect This

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELLO FRIENDS WE ARE BACK!!!!
> 
> I am most truly sorry for this chapter taking so long to go up! The reason why is in the end notes. 
> 
> The next chapter is going to go up TOMORROW as a "sorry for making you wait!" thing. After that, I'm going to try to resume the 7-10 day posting thing that I had going on before. I am very much excited to be back in this saddle!

Mona, after much debating, decided not to tell Radko about her research in the train station, and he didn't bring up the topic again. They returned to their usual pattern of hanging out a couple of times a month, chatting about what little of their lives overlapped enough to relate, and it wasn't long before Mona had all but forgotten about both the conversation and the images. She had shared the experience with Gezki, of course, who laughed at her astonishment, but agreed with her that Radko's behavior didn't seem out of the ordinary for friendship. "Remember how we were when we were kids? How huggy I was, and how uncomfortable it made you? We naturally social mammals tend to be like that. It's no wonder it feels weird for you, though," Gezki pointed out gently in their one conversation about the matter. 

As awkward as the week after had felt to her, Mona soon all but forgot about the whole thing. So, when Radko invited her to go along with him and some of his friends from work to a club by the name of Palm Street Watering Hole, she suspected nothing. 

The day they went just so happened to be the day after a test for Mona; the day Radko asked her to come along was two days before it, and in her haste to return to studying, she'd agreed without bothering to ask where they were going or for any other details. It wouldn't be the first time she'd hung out with Radko and a group of his coworkers, and she liked them well enough. 

She was playing music on her phone while cleaning her side of the dorm when Radko called. She looked up with a frown when her music stopped abruptly, and a second later she heard the buzzing and realized why it had. She quickly set down the shirt she'd just grabbed and went to pick it up before it could go to voicemail. She blinked when she saw that it was Radko. She knew by now that he hated talking on the phone because he always seemed to lose his words when he did; he hadn't called her once since the first time they had spoken.

"Hello?"

"Hi. Um." He paused for an uncomfortably long time, and Mona suppressed a sigh and said, "What's up?"

"Did you get my texts?" 

"No, I was busy cleaning, and didn't hear anything." Suddenly their plans bounced back into her memory, and she snorted. "Is it about the club we're going to today?"

"Yeah."

She glanced up at the clock on the wall. "What time is that, again?"

"Five pm. I wanted to make sure you're still coming."

"Yeah, I plan to." She glanced around her dorm. She had not quite two hours before five, but at least half of that would be eaten up in traveling to Savannah Central. She realized suddenly that she didn't even know the name of the place they were going, but she didn't really have time to be looking anything up now. "What should I wear?"

Silence stretched out for a good five seconds, and she wondered if he had disconnected. "Hello?"

"Uh. Sorry. I don't know what you have?"

She rolled her eyes. "Casual or formal? Or something else?"

"Oh, that. Uh, casual, totally casual. It's pretty hot here today, though, so you might want to wear something, uh... dress lightly."

"Okay." She glanced over her clothes. She needed her hooves free to find some that were suitable, and she could feel Radko's discomfort about the phone call, so she said, "Text me where to meet you, then?"

"Yeah. I did. I don't know if it went through?"

Remembering the texts she hadn't yet seen, she said, "I'll text you if it didn't, then. See you soon, Radko."

"Bye, Mona."

She hung up and immediately checked her phone for notifications. Sure enough, she had a few texts from Radko, one of which detailed when and where she needed to meet him for them to be on time. She quickly texted back to confirm that she'd seen the information, and then put her phone in her pocket and went to find appropriate clothes. 

 

 

Radko, as he said he would, met her at the platform when she got off the train. He was dressed in a simple collared shirt and some beat-up old jeans, and she briefly wondered at the contrast, but didn't mention it. 

"You look nice," he said by way of greeting, offering a grin that showed just about every tooth in his muzzle. 

"Thanks," Mona said, caught off guard by his expression. He rarely commented on her appearance, and the look on his face didn't seem to match the polite cadence of his words. He promptly started describing how they would get to the club, so she let it exit her mind quickly in order to focus on what he was saying instead. 

They were to walk a couple of blocks to a nearby gas station, where one of Radko's friends from work would pick them up. 

"What did you say the name of the place was?"

"Palm Street Watering Hole."

Mona nodded. "I've never been to a club," she admitted, "What's it like?"

Radko's broad, toothy grin was back, again broader and toothier than normal. "You'll see."

Mona gave him a look, trying to hide a small flash of alarm. His grin turned sheepish, and he lowered his ears. "Don't worry, I'd never drag you into anything shady or dangerous. You'll be perfectly fine."

At that, Mona had to smile. "Okay, fine," she said, though a niggling thought at the back of her mind had her wondering whether she was smart to trust him. 

Their ride turned out to be Eric, with a lynx who Mona had never met already in the front passenger seat. She and Radko climbed into the back with brief greetings exchanged, and they set out. 

The ride was a little odd; Eric and Radko talked idly, but the lynx stayed quiet, and Mona, without anything to say coming to mind, did too. She caught the lynx giving her a few funny looks when her eyes were focused somewhere out the window, but she couldn't guess why, so she didn't dwell on it. 

The moment they pulled up, Mona felt some misgiving. The building looked nice enough, but the windows were all completely dark, covered from the inside by a flat surface that let no light through. There was a sign facing the street that stated the name of the place in a large, simple font, with a logo next to it that resembled a tail that was not obviously supposed to be any particular species. There was a lion in a simple, black t-shirt standing by the door, which was right next to the corner of the building. The front of his shirt bore only the logo on the sign, printed in white just below his collarbones. 

They stayed in the car for a few minutes until another car showed up, which the lynx recognized immediately, and they all got out to greet the rest of their party. An antelope from the other car greeted Eric warmly, and said, "Craig letting you out alone today?"

Eric laughed. "He's feeling under the weather today."

"I guess we'll have to keep an eye on you, then," the lynx joked. Mona tried to guess the lynx's sex from their voice, because she had not been able to from their body and dress, but was still left wondering. 

"Oh haha, we both know you're more likely to go wild than me."

Among laughter from the others, they made their way towards the lion at the door. He calmly checked their IDs--Mona was suddenly glad that she had decided to bring her wallet after all, even though Radko had promised that the outing was on him--and let them in without speaking once. 

The moment the door was closed, they were plunged into darkness. Mona blinked several times to urge her eyes to adjust more quickly, but was still caught off guard when Radko took her elbow and gently moved her off to the side. From somewhere deeper in the building, she could clearly hear the rhythmic thud of loud music. A mammal up ahead approached them; Mona could just barely make out a round shape and a pair of hoofed feet, illuminated by strips of lights at floor level. 

"Hello, and welcome to the Palm Street Watering Hole. Are any of you first-timers here?"

Mona wondered for a moment if she should speak up, but then the lynx said, "Yeah, we have one who hasn't been here."

"Step up to me, please."

Mona stepped forward, Radko remaining at her elbow, and as she drew nearer, she was able to make out the speaker as a black sheep. 

"Please read our rules," he said, handing her a tablet, it's screen mercifully dim. She blinked and tried to focus on it, but a moment later she had to look up. "Can you make the text bigger? I didn't bring my glasses."

"I can't, unfortunately, but I would be happy to read it out to you."

"Can the rest of us go ahead?" someone asked from behind her. 

"As long as you're already in our system, go ahead and swipe your IDs as you enter," he said, gesturing towards the door behind him and stepping out of the way. The mammals in their party filed past one at a time, until it was only the ram, herself, and Radko left in the entrance hall. She looked down at him. "You can go ahead."

"I'd rather wait with you, if you don't mind." 

Mona shrugged, and turned back to the ram. "Go ahead, thank you."

As he began reading out loud, she grew increasingly concerned. The rules on the form seemed simple enough, but a lot of them were confusing her: "Don't touch the dancers unless they explicitly invite you to. Don't take up a dancer's time and attention without paying for it. No cell phones, and no cameras or recording devices of any kind. Do not harass other patrons."

At the end of a long list of such rules, he finally handed the tablet back to her. "Sign at the bottom, here, if you agree to obey all of these rules. We have the right to remove you if you break any of them or act in an inappropriate way."

Mona, heart thudding, signed. 

The ram asked to see her ID, and she handed it over. "Wait here, I need to put you in our system. It'll only be a minute."

The instant he was gone, Mona turned her attention--though not her gaze--to Radko. "What kind of place is this?" she hissed quietly. 

He looked taken aback, now that her eyes had adjusted enough to see his expression, but then he grinned. "It's a fur club," he said cheekily.

She paused. She had heard the term before, but she wasn't certain whether she remembered correctly what it meant. She decided to feign complete ignorance. "What the hell is a fur club?"

Radko hesitated, and just as Mona was considering demanding an answer, the ram returned with her ID. "Here you go, Ms Johnstoni. You're all set. Please swipe your ID at the door, and have a nice evening." 

Mona thanked him automatically, then looked at Radko, flicking her ears, feeling more awkward by the moment but unwilling to let him get out of answering the question. He smiled up at her, a smile more genuine than the toothy grins he'd been giving her, and said, "It's really better you see it for yourself." He broke eye contact to rummage in his pockets, and pulled out a roll of bills--a one-dollar bill visible on the outside--and offered it to her. "You coming in? I promise, it'll be better than you think."

Heaving a sigh, again wondering just how stupid she was being to trust him, she grabbed the roll from his paw and stepped towards the door. "Alright."

"Yesss," he hissed happily, and turned to swipe his ID. 

Mona, trepidation tightening her chest, did the same, and they stepped through the door. 

Mona immediately sneezed. She had been preparing herself for the loud music and for whatever she might see, but she had not expected all the aromas. The air was thick with the smell of mammals; predator smells and prey smells, all heightened, sweetened,  _ sharpened  _ by the smell of arousal and lust. It was a musky smell, part fresh and part old, hanging in air that was stale enough it was clear the place never saw an opened window. The scent of alcohol was nearly as strong, and a few different perfumes tickled her nose. She took a more cautious breath, already adjusting to the atmosphere, and took a look around. 

The lights were dim and multicolored, but to her relief, none of them were flashing or changing rapidly. There were bodies everywhere, many moving around and just as many sitting--slouching--on nearly every available chair and couch. As she glanced around, her eyes were drawn to the biggest source of light and movement in the room--the the main stage--and she laced her ears back warily. There were three performers on stage, two prey and a predator whose species Mona didn't recognize. Not one of them was wearing anything more covering than a bikini, and as soon as she realized just what kind of dances they were doing, she averted her eyes. Looking for something else to focus on, she caught sight Radko's grinning face. 

"What?" she said, almost having to yell to be heard over the loud music and the low roar of noise from all of the mammals in the room.

Radko stepped even closer and stretched up to say, loudly, at her ear, "You look a little shook, there."

"I was adjusting to the air," she said stiffly, and then immediately had to repeat herself more loudly for him to hear her. The realization of what she had walked into was only beginning to sink in, and through her discomfort, she couldn't think of anything better to say.

"I know, right? The smell is pretty intense. You'll get used to it in a couple minutes, though," he yelled. He gently nudged her to the side, and they stepped away so that they weren't blocking the door in case someone else came in. In doing so, Radko almost tripped over an aardvark leaning against the wall, who snorted at him in irritation and then vanished into the crowd.

"Want to go find a seat? Looks like the others are up by the main stage. Would you rather sit there, or further away?"

Mona hesitated. She knew where she wanted to go, but what she said was, "What do you prefer?"

He shrugged. "Being up front is fun, but it's also nice to sit back and watch from a distance. I usually do a little of each."

"Further back, then."

Radko grabbed her hoof and turned to lead the way, gently tugging her along. For a moment she was annoyed by him taking the liberty, but the place was crowded enough that she soon realized that she might have lost him otherwise. He had to search for a minute to find a place to sit, pulling Mona in a few different directions as he did, and finally brought them to a table that wasn't particularly near anything except the bathroom--the main stage and the two smaller stages were each at least twenty feet away. The table was tiny and high up, and there was one plush chair next to it, in the one-size-fits-most style that a lot of businesses bought. Radko let go of Mona next to the table, and yelled "Go ahead and sit!" and cast around as she did so. Finding what he was looking for, he scampered over to a table two away and quickly snagged a chair of the same type and carried it, with a little difficulty, back to the table. He set it down next to Mona's chair paused to fiddle with a lever under the table before sitting down, and with his other paw on top of the table to push downwards, he adjusted it to a comfortable height for both of them, then sat down. She felt her ear flicking as he moved his chair closer than he usually sat, but she understood why when he started to speak; the music and the noise from the other mammals was loud enough that he had to be close to be heard without shouting. 

"Good so far?" he asked, leaning her way so she could hear.

"I guess so."

They sat for a minute in silence while Mona looked around. After her initial glance, she had been avoiding looking right at the dancers, still discomforted with staring right at naked or mostly naked mammals, even if that's why they were there. Instead, she looked around the room. There were a lot of couches, chairs, and small tables scattered around most of the space, most of them obscured by mammals of various sizes. Some of the couches and chairs were ripped and stained in places, or had clearly been repaired at some point, and the tables--theirs included--had many scratch marks in it. Some of them were probably accidental, but some were initials or names or words, scored into the plastic. There was a bar near the stage with shelves upon shelves of bottles behind it, and a sign on the wall behind the right side of the bar listing a series of snacks and their prices. The the bar and the stage were both lined with high stools, almost all occupied. As Mona started taking closer looks at the mammals around her, she realized that most were patrons, but and a few were performers, scantily clad in tiny, brightly colored outfits. Some were talking, some flirting, some...teasing. Again, Mona found something else to look at. 

She jumped when Radko laid a gentle paw on her arm. "It's okay, you don't have to feel uncomfortable," he said, leaning in further to speak even more quietly than he had a moment before. "This is just a job to them. They've seen it all. And they're literally here so we can stare at them all we like."

She snorted. "I know," she said, perhaps a little more shortly than she should have, "but it's not like I've been somewhere like this before."

He gave an uneasy chuckle and withdrew his paw. "Well, I'm gonna go get a quick snack. You want anything?"

Mona just shook her head, so he stood up, brushed his claws gently through the long fur fringing her ear--Mona barely hid her surprised shudder--and headed for the bar, his tufty tail switching back and forth. 

Mona, suddenly more uneasy at being alone than Radko's idle touches had made her, immediately regretted snapping at him, and wondered if it was too late to go with him. She quieted the thoughts. He'd be back in only a moment, and nothing bad was going to befall her. It was a fur club, not a den of thieves and muggers.

"Hey there, sweetheart."

Mona almost jumped out of her skin as a voice came from behind her, and an instant later a hoof dropped onto her shoulder and a heavy, musky smell came over her, making her eyes widen in alarm. She turned to see a male ungulate with... a trunk like a tapir's? He was standing in a way that showed off his chest muscles and was wearing nothing but a tiny black thong, and as Mona realized that she was looking at the obvious bulge in the front of it, she snapped her eyes back up to his face. His smile would have been charming if she wasn't so on edge already. He sat down in the seat that Radko had just vacated; he was no bigger than Radko, she realized as he settled back into the chair, slouching comfortably with his legs apart. Mona avoided glancing down. The smell coming from him--half horny musk, half perfume--was cloying and heavy. Some small part, deep in her brain, wanted to respond with excitement, but it only succeeded in heightening the low-level panic after the startle he'd given her. 

"How you doing tonight, sweetheart? Having a good time?"

"I--I'm fine, thank you," she forced out, failing to make any kind of eye contact. 

"Aw, don't be nervous, honey. We're all casual here." He smiled what must have been his best winning smile, but Mona could only manage a grimace in return. A loud cheering and whooping broke out from somewhere near the stage, drawing both her ears to it in alarm, and he chuckled. "Well, some people get pretty excited, of course," he amended, his tone suggestive. For a beat there was silence between them, Mona unable to think of a single thing to say to make him go away or even just to keep the conversation casual, and then he said, "Can I interest you in any special services? I give a sensational lap dance, especially to larger ladies like yourself."

That caught Mona off guard; she'd never been called larger, but she realized that to an ungulate his size, a lot of his customers were likely to be larger than he was. 

She was still trying to think of how to respond when Radko appeared, a cellophane bag in his paw. 

"Hi," He said cheerfully, giving the--maybe he was an antelope? Mona still couldn't make sense of his unusual face--an appreciative once-over. "Much as I appreciate the view, would you mind if I got my seat back?"

"Oh, no problem at all," he said, hopping up quickly. Clearly having gotten the hint that Mona wasn't interested, he struck a pose in front of Radko, his crotch near enough eye level to make Mona wince, but Radko didn't seem bothered. "Might I interest  _ you _ in a dance?"

"Thanks, buddy, but not now. But could you do me a favor?" He fished his roll of ones out of his pocket and extracted a handful--maybe twenty or so, though he clearly wasn't counting--from it. "Would you mind passing on my compliments to the other performers, for now? It'll be a while until I make it up to the stages, but I don't want to be rude until then."

The antelope grinned, took the bills with a flourish, and leaned down to plant a kiss on the top of Radko's head. "You're a sweetheart," he said, tucking the bills into the strap that went over his hip. "Anyone else you would like me to send your way?"

"Not now, but thank you."

The antelope turned and sauntered off, the tip of his tail flicking just under Radko's nose in a way that had to have been intentional, and Radko finally turned to look at Mona. He grinned when he saw the relieved look on her face. "Did he ambush you?"

"Yes," she said weakly, and covered her face. 

Radko laughed, but just as she was about to uncover her face long enough to give him a dirty look, he subsided and reached out to briefly rub her back between her shoulder blades. She flinched at the unexpected contact, but then forced herself to relax until he withdrew his paw a moment later. "They like to do that," he said, and shrugged. "I like the attention, but I'll try to keep them off you, if it makes you feel better."

She took her hooves away. "Please do." 

Smiling to himself, Radko opened his cellophane bag with a loud crackle. "Barbecue chip?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I am like Mona in at least one aspect: I have never been to a strip club. I've barely even been to a bar. So writing this chapter was a pain in the ass. I had to juggle describing the environment accurately, making Mona and Radko act in ways that would make the scene play out how I wanted it (Radko started out being a lot more insensitive, but I quickly realized that Mona would nope right out of there, so I had to make him chill), and weaving in certain... elements of Radko's behavior that are going to come to light in the next chapter. Stay tuned for it tomorrow!


	26. In Which Mona Is Not Having Any Of This

"What... species is she?"

Radko tore his eyes off of whatever mammal he had been watching--Mona had stopped following his gaze after the third time she found herself staring along with him at a sight she wasn't all that keen on seeing--and followed her pointed muzzle. The predator that had been on the main stage when they walked in had returned to it. The mammal appeared to be completely naked, and Mona guessed that they might be female because she hadn't spotted a penis yet, but their fur was so long and shaggy that she couldn't make out any details one way or another. 

Radko's ears perked up. "Oh, wolverine. She's a beauty, isn't she?"

Mona didn't answer that. "How is she... doing that?"

Radko watched her for a moment. She was spinning around one of the poles, which was pinned between her thighs, and she had only one finger hooked around it higher up. "Doing what?"

"Staying on the pole? There's no way she can get enough traction with her thighs through all of that fur."

Radko grinned at her, his face delighted. "Hell if I know. Wolverines are stupid strong, though. And fierce. She's probably holding herself up through sheer power of will alone."

Mona watched, curiously, as the wolverine lowered herself gracefully down the pole, still spinning all the while, and then finally touched down flawlessly on one footpaw. She approached one of the mammals at the edge of the stage who was yelling to her louder than the others, a black bear that Mona had no idea the gender of, and, after speaking for a moment to her customer and taking bills (which she tossed behind her instead of tucking away somewhere as all the others seemed to do, convincing Mona that she was, in fact, completely naked), she stepped smoothly onto the shoulder of the bear. Mona watched until whatever they were doing--the wolverine appeared to be standing on the bear's back and leaning over their head until her breasts (if they could be found under all the fur) were even with the bear's eyes. Mona found somewhere else to look. 

"Her control is impressive." She admitted quietly.

"Hell yes. What is she  _ doing _ to that bear's face?" Radko was leaning forward in interest, his tail wagging.

"I think I'd rather not know."

Radko chuckled at that, his eyes returning to her face. "Having any fun yet?" he asked in a quiet voice.

She just shrugged. "Not... really? It's not as bad as I thought it would be, though."

He pointed at a clock on the wall behind them. "Well, it's been that half hour I asked for. Not so bad, see?"

She shrugged again. 

"Seen anything you like?" he asked, leaning back a little see her face better, and for a moment she wondered why he was giving her such a cocky look. 

"I don't really... ever look at other mammals like this," she said hesitantly. 

"Well, that's what's great about this. They get paid for you to stare, so it's not awkward."

She flicked an ear. "I don't think I'd ever enjoy it as much as you. It still feels awkward."

He sat forward again, leaning towards her so he didn't have to talk as loudly. "Well, don't you find any of them attractive? I know they aren't okapis, but... what about that antelope who came over earlier? He's got some nice muscles going on."

She glanced at the antelope in question, currently climbing onto the stage. "He has a nice body," she said, shrugging again, "I'm sure he's very attractive, but I don't... really get anything out of looking at him."

He was silent for a moment, but then piped up again, "Okay, what about the wolverine?"

"What about her?"

"You can enjoy the performance of it, can't you? How she spun on that pole?"

"It's impressive, but... I don't really..." She paused, unsure how to finish that sentence. "It's like watching sports when I don't know about either of the teams, or care about the sport."

He nudged her foot with his under the table and nodded. "I get that," he said. "Well, if you want to leave, I'll go too. But would you mind if we go up to one of the stages for a few minutes?"

Mona opened her mouth to say that that was fine, but then paused. Back here, at their table, she was far enough away from everything that she didn't feel overwhelmed, but up there..."

"You can leave any time you want," he said, seeing her face. "If you sit alone, they'll be more likely to come up to you, so... if you feel like you have to go, just... go to the bathroom. Then give me a minute, and when you come out, I'll be outside. We can call that Zuber, no problem."

Reassured, she sighed. "Yeah, okay."

"Really?"

She gave him a droll look. "Don't make me change my mind."

Grinning, he grabbed her arm. "Well, c'mon then."

They rejoined the group they'd arrived with, sitting down at the right end of the main stage, and after Eric relinquished his seat to her, assuring her that he didn't mind standing, Mona found herself sitting on the very last stool in the long line of stools. Radko, standing behind her, the height of the stool putting his muzzle just even with her shoulder, stretched up slightly to speak in her ear, his paw on her shoulder to keep his balance. "Now, check that out," he murmured in her ear, "It looks--and smells--like Lenny's having a good time." 

Mona blinked. She gave him a quizzical look, but he didn't seem to know what she was trying to ask, so she turned her head until her muzzle was close to his ear. He realized what she was doing and quickly turned his head to put his ear closer, making some of his tufty fur tickle her nostrils. She jerked her head away just in time to avoid sneezing in his ear. 

Radko laughed. "Sorry," he said, loud enough to be heard over the music, and then turned his head to present his ear, holding still this time. She leaned in. "I don't know which one Lenny is," she said quietly in his ear.

He moved around to her side so he could position his muzzle next to her ear without pulling his ear too far away, allowing them to speak without the back-and-forth. "He's the lynx."

She glanced over at Lenny, who was watching the mammal on stage with a glassy-eyed concentration, his short tail twitching rapidly. Not sure what else to say, she commented, "He certainly seems focused."

"He reeks of pheromones, and... well, just look at that tent."

Mona, confused, took a closer look. Lenny certainly wasn't paying enough attention to catch her, so she didn't try to be brief, and after a moment, she noticed what Radko had--the obvious bulge in the front of his pants. She looked away. "I see," she whispered tensely. "I... don't know how to recognize feline pheromones, though," she added, wondering immediately if she should have said anything.

Radko, instead of responding, lowered his nose and gave her neck a few quizzical sniffs. She leaned away enough to give him a look, and he grinned sheepishly and pointed his nose towards her ear again. She begrudgingly leaned in again to let him whisper, "You smell pretty normal. I guess this stuff isn't doing it for you?"

Glad that she did smell normal, Mona shrugged. "Not really."

Radko pulled back to look at her face, then leaned in again, putting a paw on her arm as he did. "I don't get into it as much as them, honestly. It's nice, though."

Mona didn't have anything to say about that, and after a moment, Radko turned back around to look at the stage, the motion sudden enough that Mona didn't pull her head back, and the fur of his ear brushed across her muzzle just as she inhaled. Her nose twitched, but it wasn't enough of a tickle to make her sneeze. Still, she realized that he smelled different. Under the faint smells of shampoo and deodorizer, she could smell the sharp, slightly rank smell of hyena that she had grown accustomed to. Right now, though, he smelled stronger than normal, and not in the same way that he had when he'd been in constant need of a shower--his smell was more layered, and there was a strong musk that was covering up some of the usual sharpness of his smell. Mona laced her ears back when she realized that the musk must be arousal, and she turned her nose away to avoid catching any other whiffs of it. She had never had any desire to know what he smelled like when aroused, and she wished she could erase the memory. She looked down and fiddled with the edge of her shirt in her hooves, wishing she was allowed to pull out her phone. 

Mona pricked her ears as she realized that there was some discussion and activity going on among the group that they were with, but just far enough away that she couldn't make anything out. Radko seemed unconcerned, however, so she tried not to worry about it. She was starting to get thirsty, so she quietly excused herself and went over to the bar. She stood between two empty stools, unwilling to sit down when she wasn't intending to stay, and got the attention of the bartender after a moment. She bought a bottle of water and returned to the group, and saw Radko looking for her as she approached. 

"The guys and I are gonna go over to that stage for a while," he said, gesturing to one in the middle of the room, with a thick crowd around it and a lioness dancing suggestively around another pole. "Eric is going to go hang out at the bar, though. What would you prefer to do?"

Eric, hearing his name, turned and approached them, and stood listening. Mona glanced at him, then looked back at Radko. "What does... that mean?"

"They're gonna get a bit more up-close and personal with her for a while," Eric interjected. "The center stage tends to be pretty in-your-face and crowded. I'm not into females, much less female predators, so I'm sitting this one out. You want to stay with me, Mona? I suspect that if you're uncomfortable now, you won't like it in there."

Mona blinked. Had she been so transparent? "I'm fine, really," she insisted. 

Eric and Radko both smiled at her, and she frowned as she saw that both of their faces bore knowing looks. "Sweetie," Eric said gently, "You're doing very well, but it's clear that you don't exactly like it here."

Mona lowered her ears until they rose no higher than the top of her head. Radko, seeing the others start to move off, quickly said, "Will you be okay?"

Mona, not really sure that she would be, nodded nonetheless. 

"Okay. If you need anything, come get me."

"Will do."

He stepped forward to give her a quick, bumbling, one-armed hug, and then scurried hastily after the others. 

Eric watched him go, face impassive, and then turned to look at Mona. "I take it you don't feel the same way about him?"

"What?" He hadn't spoken loudly, and she wasn't sure she'd heard him correctly, because she couldn't parse his meaning. 

He chuckled. "C'mon, I'm hungry," he said, and turned away.

She followed him to the bar, still trying to figure out what he'd just said, but gave up. She sat next to him when they reached the line of stools. The music wasn't blaring quite as loudly here, and so as she looked over the list of foods they could buy, she said, "What was it you said back there?"

He paused, but then looked at her and said, "I said that I take it you don't feel the same way about Radko." At her blank look, he said, "The same way he feels about you?" and then turned away to get the bartender's attention. 

Mona stopped. She stared. Her mind raced;  _ feels about me? _ she thought, baffled. She suddenly recalled, vividly, the looks on Radko's face--written off in her mind as mischief because of the prank of not telling her. All the times he'd touched her, rested a paw on her, leaned in--written off as the pawsy nature of a pack predator showing the familiarity of a friend. He had been gradually getting touchier lately, but Mona hadn't thought anything of it. 

She realized suddenly that Eric had gotten the bartender's attention and was asking for a drink and a bag of some kind of snack mix, and she made herself snap out of it and focus on her surroundings. She quickly asked for a bag of a kind of vegetable chips she recognized without much thought, and let Eric pay for it after only a very brief attempt to argue. She gathered her thoughts as the bartender moved off to get their orders. She had never sat at a bar either, but she felt more comfortable here; at least they were away from the stage. 

After an extended moment of silence, Mona finally decided which of the hundred questions in her head that she wanted to ask, and said, "How...  _ does _ he feel about me?"

Eric shrugged. "It's a hunch. I'm no predator, and not a grouping species--"

"Me either."

"--so I might be reading the signals wrong. He definitely gives off signals around you, though, that he doesn't give around anyone else."

Mona, chest tight, thought she knew what he was getting at, but she had to confirm. "Signals of what?"

"Frankly, I think the boy's head over heels for you. I'm surprised you haven't noticed."

Mona sat back and took a deep breath, then let it out in a quick rush. "It's never occured to me," she said quietly, and then looked intently at him. "What kind of signals? What does he do?"

Eric shrugged. "He looks at you different. He's always finding a reason to have a paw on you. He talks about you a lot. And I mean a lot. Every other conversation at work is Mona this and Mona that." He smiled at her. "Not that I really mind. You seem like a very nice mammal. Still, it's made me wonder, and seeing how he's been behaving tonight is confirmation enough for me." He paused to take a bite, and after he swallowed it, he added, "Really, though, how do you feel about him? It doesn't seem like you like him, but maybe you just aren't as demonstrative as he is."

Mona shook her head. "I've never thought about him as more than a friend," she said quietly. 

"Ah," Eric said, his tone knowing. "That's unfortunate, for both of you."

 

 

Mona didn't say much else to Eric, but he didn't seem bothered by the silence; he ate the food in front of him, watched the performers around the room, and helped Mona fend off one who came over to try to entice them. 

Mona barely noticed her surroundings; she was deep in thought. Now that she had a little more time to think, she was going back over all of her interactions with Radko lately, and wondering if she was actually noticing what Eric had mentioned, or was making up significance within her memories because she was caught on the idea that Radko might have feelings for her. He had been acting a little strangely now and then, but she would never have guessed... his interactions with her were just awkwardness due to their vastly different species, weren't they? That's what she had assumed. 

Her mind jumped back to the present as a loud noise some distance away gave her a slight start, but she didn't even bother to try to figure out what it had been. Radko had brought her here without running it by her, put her intentionally into this uncomfortableness, maybe as an excuse to be closer to her. She stared at the area that Radko had gone to, and after a moment, she managed to pick him out of the crowd. He was right up at the front on the other side of the round stage, taller mammals behind pressing him right up along the stage edge, but he didn't seem to mind. His eyes were glued to the lioness on the stage. Mona narrowed her eyes as she thought about his behavior. Maybe his wandering paws had something to do with the loose atmosphere of the place. Maybe he thought he could get away with more in this environment. Dragging her into coming along didn't quite seem like him, but she didn't doubt that, judgement clouded by feelings and with enough cajoling from his friends, he could be goaded into it. 

Still, thoughts churning with the idea that he might have an ulterior motive, she clenched her jaw and looked away. Being in a fur club was bad enough--she had, to an extent, wanted to never go to one--but the notion that Radko could have brought her here just to see how much he could get away with made her angry. She sat for a moment, staring at the bar and fuming silently, but then she stood up suddenly. Eric, mouth half full, raised an eyebrow at her. 

"I'm going to go," she said suddenly. For a moment she considered leaving without saying anything else, conscious of the fact that there was a chance that Eric could be one of the ones who had egged Radko on, but then the reigned in the impulse. "Tell Radko not to worry when he asks where I've gone, I just... I've had enough of this place," she said, going for ambiguous honesty.

"Not going to tell him yourself?"

She made herself answer quickly so that her thoughts wouldn't become obvious. "I just don't want to try to fight my way through that throng."

"You going to be able to get home alright?"

"I'll get a Zuber."

"Okay. Have a nice night, Mona."

She wished him the same, and left as quickly as she could.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so glad to have this posted and over with. The first draft of this chapter and the previous one was pretty terrible, and I had to make a lot of little edits to make them work. 
> 
> I'm sorry to have kept you all waiting this long, and I hope you're all still around to enjoy this story as I get it rolling again?


	27. In Which Gezki Gets All The Updates

Mona knocked on Gezki's door, biting her lip. She hadn't called or texted ahead, and she had no idea whether Gezki was even home--her path from the bus stop didn't take her past the parking garage where Gezki's truck resided, and she had not paused after leaving her dorm, not until now. She waited for a moment and then, not sure if the time that had passed had been a few or many seconds, she knocked again. 

"I'm COMING," Gezki yelled from inside, sounding exasperated, and Mona immediately felt bad for being impatient. The door opened only seconds later, and Gezki's frown immediately evaporated. "Oh, hi Mona. What's the matter with you? Your face looks all tight. Come in, I'll make tea."

Gezki didn't press. As loud, rambunctious, and nosy as she often was, she knew by now that all she had to do was wait for Mona to speak. Mona sat at the table and gathered her thoughts while Gezki made tea--probably something with chamomile, by the smell. She checked her phone briefly, saw a few texts from Radko, and dismissed the notification without reading any of them. She could deal with that later. 

Finally, when they were seated across from each other, a mug in front of each, Mona took a deep breath and started talking. "So, you know that fur club thing that I got dragged into a week ago?"

Gezki didn't answer immediately, so Mona looked at her face, which was pensive. "Sorta. You texted me about it, but your texts... didn't make a lot of sense."

Mona sighed. "Yeah, I was... ramble-texting. I guess I'm not surprised that you didn't respond."

Gezki pulled a face. "I meant to, but I've had a lot to think about and I forgot to."

Mona tilted her head. "What have you got to think about?"

Gezki waved away the question. "We'll talk about that after. So, tell me about this sordid fur club experience of yours."

Mona took another deep breath to steel herself, and then launched into an account of the evening. Gezki, to her credit, only snickered a little when Mona described her impressions of the place. Mona tried to keep her descriptions of Radko's behavior neutral, but Gezki's face held a lot of suspicion by the time she got to recounting the conversation with Eric.

"Ah-ha, I wondered where that was going."

"I'm really surprised I didn't see it. I'm usually a lot more perceptive of mammals than that, and Radko... wasn't being all that subtle, now that I think about it."

"So you believe it's true? Have you confirmed with him?"

Mona pulled a face. "No," she admitted quietly. "I tried, though..."

Gezki steepled her fingers. "Yes? Go on."

Mona paused to decide where to start. "Well, as soon as Radko figured out that I had left, he texted me. At first he was concerned, and I assured him that I was fine, but then he started cajoling me to come back and asking prodding, but ambiguous questions."

"Like what?"

Mona frowned. "Things like, 'You saw some things you liked tonight, right?' with a winky face." Gezki grimaced, and she nodded. "Yeah, I didn't answer that one. I asked him why he'd really brought me there, and he said, 'I just wanted to see how you'd react,' and when I asked him to what, he stopped answering. I was... I left because I was pretty unhappy with him for bringing me there without asking, and mad about the idea that he might have brought me partially because he thought he could get away with acting more..." She paused, knowing that the word intimate felt most accurate, but unwilling to say it. "Familiar with me than he usually does. I was so uncomfortable already, Gez. And the idea that he might have brought me there just to see how much he could get away with putting his paws on me..." she paused to shake her head until her ears flapped. "At the time, I didn't even care if it was true or not, I was just mad."

"With good reason!"

"Yeah, I thought so too."

They sipped their tea for a moment, but then Gezki said, "So, that all happened a week ago? What made you suddenly show up today unannounced?"

Mona took her time taking a few long sips before she answered. "So... today, when I got out of class, I went back to my dorm like always... to find Radko sitting in my chair, talking to Lilac. He showed up, unannounced, because I haven't really been answering him since then, and when he didn't find me there, he decided to take Lilac's invitation to hang out, instead of just... coming back later, or contacting me to ask me to meet up or something."

"Pushy."

"Very. Anyway, apparently they'd been talking at least a little bit about the reason he was there, because the moment I stepped in, they exchanged looks and Lilac left without a word." Mona stopped again to sip her tea and think about what to say next, then carried on. "So, at first he seemed... benign enough. He said that he was worried about me and worried that he'd upset me too much because I wasn't really responding to his texts. I didn't really want to get into it right then, because I was tired after class, so I told him that I wasn't mad, and that I just needed time to process that evening. But... I was feeling a little bit irritable when I said it, so he clearly didn't buy it. 

"He just stared at me, and then started pushing for a straight answer. He even started trying to guilt trip me, saying that he had stopped keeping anything from me and that I shouldn't keep anything from him, and... that made me lose my temper a little, so I told him what Eric said to me, and... he fell silent really quickly."

"He didn't say anything?"

"I gave him a moment, but he didn't. So I asked him if it was true. He just scratched his neck, looking really embarrassed."

"Aw, shit."

"Yeah, it definitely wasn't a no."

"So what happened then?"

"I asked him what he was thinking. I... probably got a little too pushy with my tone, and I don't think he understood what I was trying to say, because he got defensive immediately. He started saying stuff about how it wasn't his fault and that I couldn't really blame him, and that he had been so worried when I just left like that. I accused him of bringing me to the fur club just to try his luck, and I didn't realize that I was waving my hooves around until he grabbed them.

"I tried to pull away, but his grip is really strong. He said that I could hardly blame him for that either, because I hadn't gotten any of the other hints that he had been trying to drop. I told him that he should have just talked to me, and he said, 'Well I'm here now, and I'm talking. I'm not leaving until we figure this out.'"

“Really. And did you?"   
  
"No, I was too mad at him to have a conversation, so I pulled my hooves out of his grip, probably because he let me, told him that I wasn't going to have that conversation shouted--because we were both getting pretty loud by then--and said that if he wasn't leaving, then I would. And I did. He didn't say anything else, or try to stop me."

"Damn, girl. You're not even dating yet, and you're already fighting."

Mona glared at her, anger spiking again, but Gezki shook her head. "I'm kidding, I'm kidding. You know I am."

Mona took another moment to glare, but without any real heat behind it, then sighed and picked up her mug. "I just needed to go somewhere for a while," she said quietly, "And I know he won't follow me here."

"How do you figure?"

"I think he's a bit scared of you."

Gezki snorted. "You're probably right."

They sat in silence for a moment, each mulling it over, and then Gezki spoke up. "Do you know if he wants a relationship, or if he's just attracted to you?"

Mona pulled a face at the idea. "I don't know at all. He certainly acts like he cares about me as a mammal, and he hasn't started getting weird about it until recently. We've been friends for almost a year now. I don't think he's just..."

"Looking for a casual fuck?"

Mona grimaced. "I certainly hope not."

Gezki grinned. "I don't know him as well as you, of course, but for what it's worth, I think it's much more likely that he actually likes you. He acts like he cares, not like he's just in it for the tail."

"Gezki!"

"What? Does the idea of getting it on with him bother you?"

"Yes!" Mona set her mug down a little more loudly than she really needed to.

Gezki gave her an odd look. "So, you don't like him that way at all."

It wasn't really a question, but Mona shook her head anyway.

Gezki shrugged. "His loss, then. So, how are you going to deal with this?"

Mona groaned. "I really have no idea."

  
  


Once their conversation lapsed into silence and Gezki left Mona sitting at the table to return to the chores she'd abandoned--"Stay as long as you want, love, and call me over if you need me, but if you don't, then I got shit I need to get done."--Mona finally checked her phone. She had three texts from Radko.

_ I'm sorry, I didn't mean to yell at you. Please come back. _

Then, ten minutes later:  _ Lilac came back and looked at me funny, so I left. I'm sorry I drove you away. Please tell me that we're still friends. Can we talk about this? _

And the third, about thirty minutes after that:  _ Mona? _

She heaved a deep sigh and set her phone down to sip her tea and think. A minute later, she picked it back up to start composing a text. 

Ten minutes later, she called out, "Gezki?"

"Yeah?"

"Can you come read this and tell me if you think it's okay?"

Gezki padded back into the kitchen and took the phone from Mona. She raised her eyebrows at the text that Mona had typed in, and then started reading it aloud. "Yes, we are still friends. I'm a little mad at you for how you handled this, and uncomfortable with some of the implications of what you've done lately, but once we both have a chance to cool down, I'll talk about it with you." She handed Mona's phone back and shrugged. "Seems just fine to me."

"I've spent the last five minutes adding more to it and then deleting it again. Should I say anything else?"

Gezki made a thoughtful face, but then shook her head. "Save it for the talk you'll have."

Mona nodded, and hit send, then set her phone down and resolved to stop thinking about it for the moment. "Can I crash here tonight, by the way? I don't really want to have to face Lilac's questions tonight."

Gezki pulled a face. "The loft is pretty... stripped. There's not even a mattress in it anymore. And you certainly wouldn't fit in my bed with me." She paused, grimaced, and then added, "That reminds me of the other thing I wanted to talk to you about." She resumed her position in the chair across from Mona. "I forgot, what with all the hyena-based nonsense going on in your life."

"Tell me about it."

Gezki paused to tap her fingers on the table, then said, "So, recently there have been a few... changes happening at work. And one of them is that they're cutting back staff by quite a bit."

Mona's ears went back. "Are you going to lose your job?"

Gezki sighed. "Not lose, no. My position is secure... but it's not staying quite the same. I'm going to lose hours, and some of my benefits as well."

"Will you be okay?"

"Perfectly fine. My overall income will be back down to close to what it was when I started, unfortunately, but... there's only really one negative consequence."

"Which is?"

"I'm not going to be able to afford to keep this place."

Mona's ears dropped, and Gezki nodded. "It's not really that bad. I have been looking into it, and it'll cost me less overall to break my lease here and move into a cheaper place as soon as possible than it would to finish out the lease. Even after the fines for doing so. Which... I might just try to get waived, on account of my income going down with no ability to change that."

"I thought your lease started at the beginning of the summer? Isn't it almost up?"

Gezki shook her head. "It just renewed, actually. When you had just come here for school, and you first contacted me asking if I wanted to have a summer roommate, I started looking around... and this place had apartments open that they were desperate to fill, so they handed me a deal if I signed the lease within the month. I really like the place, and it worked out great for us, and with the raise I had just gotten, I made just enough to cover it myself and still live pretty comfortably. So, I took it. But now, that means that I need to get out of this lease as soon as possible, because I... haven't exactly been saving as much as I should have been."

"Aw, Gez, I'm so sorry to hear that."

Gezki shrugged. "I'm a little mad about the changes happening at work, but the fact is that, even with this, the job is too good to give up. I'll miss this place, but there are plenty of other nice apartments in Zootopia that I can actually afford. Honestly, my biggest concern is you."

"Me?"

"Yes, because I can't be your roommate this summer. You're going to have to find somewhere else to go."

Before Mona even had a chance to fully process that statement, her phone buzzed. She glanced down, unlocked it, and saw a message from Radko:  _ Uncomfortable with the implications? What do you mean by that? _

She groaned and let her face hit the table, just lightly enough that it didn't actually hurt. "Why did all of this mess have to crop up right before finals season," she grumbled without lifting her head. 

Gezki laid a gentle paw on her shoulder. "Life is just like that sometimes, hon. Don't worry, you'll get through it all."

Mona picked her head back up and pulled Gezki into a hug, dragging her right into her lap. Gezki just squirmed around until she could put her arms around Mona's neck, and for a minute they sat comfortably. Mona was so glad that she had Gezki around, but now... she didn't know where to go. She'd have to find another job, find an apartment of her own... until now, she'd never lived alone, never really had to take care of herself without anyone else around to keep her on track. The notion was frightening. 

She let Gezki go, but Gezki just arranged herself on Mona's knee comfortably and snooped on her phone to see the text that Radko had sent. "Oh, golly. I guess I'm not surprised he picked that phrase to focus on. You know what you're going to say back?"

Mona sighed. "I think I'm just going to tell him to save it until we can talk in person."

"Good idea." Gezki returned to the floor, and then glanced over at Mona's mug. "Would you like more tea?"

"No, thank you. I think I should probably head back to my dorm. Radko said he's left, and I have homework I need to do. I'll just figure out what to tell Lilac on the way back."

Gezki patted her knee gently. "Don't think too hard on him, Mona. He's being pushy, but you don't owe him anything. If he really wants to be around you this much, he will get over it."

"I guess you're right."

"I know I'm right. Now go home, get your homework done, and deal with Radko only when you have the time and energy to. You'll thank yourself for not rushing into this conversation."

Mona smiled and ruffled the fur around Gezki's ear. "How do you know so much about mammals?" She said, phrasing it as a question even though she wasn't really looking for an answer. 

Gezki grinned, clearly knowing what she meant. "When you work as a nurse, you see mammals at their worst. Sometimes they see you at your worst. But I've learned a lot from it."

"Sometimes I think you know more than I'll ever learn at college."

Gezki scoffed. "It's just different stuff, is all. Now go on, I need to get back to my cleaning and packing."

Mona, her heart a lot lighter than when she had arrived, left her to it. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hang in there, guys :)


	28. In Which Mona Leaves For The Summer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for being patient with me :)

_ What about this evening? _

_ I'm going to be busy studying. _

_ This weekend? _

_ Finals are next week. I can't really put studying off. _

_ That's what you've said the last three times I asked. Can't you take one break? We still haven't talked. _

_ This semester is IMPORTANT. I can't let my grades slide. _

_ And I'm not? _

_... _

_ What? _

_ Don't guilt trip me. I don't have time or energy to deal with this right now. We'll talk when I get a chance. _

  
  


_ Good luck on your finals. _

_ Thank you. _

_ Can we talk sometime this week? _

_ Not likely. As soon as I finish one final, I'm going to have to review the material for the next. _

_ You're leaving in six days. When the hell are we going to talk? _

 

_ Mona? _

 

_ I'm sorry, I know you're stressed. I just really want to talk to you, this is really important. _

_ I get that, but I really have to prioritize this. I have a three classes where I HAVE to make a good grade on the final to keep my grades up. If I lose my scholarships, I won't even be coming back to Zootopia. _

_ I know, I'm really sorry. I'll stop bothering you. _

  
  


_ Can I at least come see you off? I miss hanging out with you.  _

_ Of course you can. _

_ Is Gezki going to be there? _

_ Probably. Do you have a problem with Gezki? _

_ No! I just wanted to say something to you, but I don't really want to if she's going to be there. _

_ I can't really ask her not to see me off too. _

_ I know. Sorry. _

  
  


_ Gezki is going to help me pack up, but then she's going to go back home. If you can meet me at my dorm tomorrow and go with me to the train station, maybe you'll have a chance to say what you want to. I can't promise anything, because my train is leaving two hours after my last final gets out, but maybe it'll give us a chance to talk a little. _

_ Yes! Thank you so much! I'll be there. What time? _

_ Show up at 3:30 pm, and I'll come down as soon as I can.  _

_ Will do. Thanks again, Mona.  _

  
  


Mona pulled her duffel bag out of the back of the closet and shook it out, sending dust flying. When she had finally remembered to get it back from Radko, she had checked it superficially for dirt and then immediately forgotten about it. Now, even months later, her shaking it out had stirred up a little of Radko's scent, still clinging lightly to it. She sighed. There was no time to wash it now, and she wasn't sure that she actually wanted to, anyway. As much as things had been weird between her and Radko lately, she couldn't bring herself to dislike the reminder of him. 

She pushed the thoughts out of her head and got up from where she'd been fishing in the closet on her knees and contemplated the clothes still hanging up. She had already taken down most of the everyday clothes, leaving a few jackets and sweaters hanging up. And, she realized with a tiny snort, her denim dress. She'd only worn it once, and then it had gone into her closet and, like the duffel bag, been forgotten. She pushed the jackets aside and pulled it towards her by the bottom hem, admiring it for a moment. It was a cute dress, and the thought that flickered through her head to get rid of it was quickly pushed aside. She might not wear it often, but as long as it still fit, she was happy to keep it around. 

"Getting lost in thought there?"

Mona blinked and let go of the dress, turning to Gezki. "Yeah."

"Well, get lost in thought once you're on the train. You're seriously out of time to do anything but pack as quickly as you can."

"You're right, you're right," Mona said, no annoyance in her tone. She tossed the duffel bag, open, onto the end of her stripped bed and quickly grabbed the rest of the things hanging in the closet. She considered the dress for a brief second, but then decided that there was no harm in wrinkling it, and shoved it into the duffel bag along with the sweaters. Gezki, opposite her at the desk, was putting the last of the scattered pens, pencils, and notebooks into her backpack, which was already full enough that Mona doubted the zippers would close easily. She had acquired a lot more things since coming to Zootopia than she had arrived with, and even with the addition of a suitcase that had been a gift from Gezki, she could barely pack all of her stuff. 

The jackets put away, she scanned the room. Other than a couple of snacks--some of them left by Lilac, others which had been up on the shelf for so long that Mona had no desire to check whether they were still good--she didn't see anything that still needed to be packed up. 

"Got it all?"

"I think so. Just need to throw these out," she said, reaching up for the shelf.

"Your phone is buzzing."

Mona quickly swept the contents of the snack shelf into the trash bag and then went to collect her phone from where she'd left it sitting on the desk in the hopes that she would notice when it went off. The message, as she'd expected, was from Radko saying that he was outside. He was only two minutes late, but he was just in time. She responded with an acknowledgement and set her phone down to zip up the duffel bag, then took one last look around. 

"I think that's everything." 

"Looks like." Gezki said. "He's outside, right? Is that what that message was?"

"Yeah."

"Let's not keep him waiting, then. I can get the backpack to the elevator if you can get the rest?" Gezki made a face, as she often did, at being able to carry so little, but as she hefted Mona's backpack--almost as big as she was--it was clear that she could not have carried more. Mona agreed with a smile and shoved her phone into her pocket, then grabbed her suitcase and duffel bag. Gezki held the door for her, and then they stepped out and let it swing shut. The outside of the door was newly devoid of paper flowers and name tags, and except that she had just stepped out of it, Mona wouldn't have been able to tell it from any other door in the hallway. 

As they walked to the elevator at the end of the hall, Gezki tilted her head. "I'm gonna miss you, nerd."

"I'm gonna miss you too. But I'll be back next fall."

"I'm a little surprised you decided to move back home instead of getting an apartment in the city. I remember you saying, a while back, that you were moving out for good." They stopped in front of the closed elevator doors and Mona hit the call button. 

Mona sighed. "I did say that, didn't I? But... I haven't seen my parents in so long, and I think I'll be better off finding a job in Fioli and saving up a little money for the summer than I would be trying to scrape by here." The elevator arrived, and they stepped inside. Mona hit the button for the ground floor. 

Gezki grimaced. "Yeah, rent gets high for mammals your size around here. You aren't quite big enough to fit in the next scale bracket, but most places that you can fit in without having to duck are a little more expensive than places like what I'm renting right now."

Mona nodded. She'd done a little looking around in between studying for finals, and Gezki was right. In Fioli, she fit into a different size category than she did in Zootopia, where she was much further from being one of the largest species around. Her pay would be better even at a minimum wage job, and she wouldn't be paying rent to her parents.

Gezki misinterpreted her pensive expression as melancholy and reached up to throw an arm around Mona's waist in a brief hug. "You'll be back before you know it."

"Yeah. I'm looking forward to being back in Fioli again, to be honest. I didn't think I would miss it much when I left."

Gezki nodded. "I like it better here, but I still miss Fioli pretty often, too."

When the elevator door opened and they stepped out into the lobby, Mona immediately looked towards the double front doors and spotted one of Radko's fluffy ears just outside of it, where he was waiting to be let in. She and Gezki headed for the doors, exchanging smiles with the RA on duty at the front desk near them. The moment Mona pushed the door open, Radko caught the handle from the outside and held it open to let them pass. They did, Gezki pretending to be oblivious as Mona's eyes met his. She saw something there that she had seen the last few times she'd met his eyes--but still was not accustomed to--something hopeful and sad and a little desperate. She tried not to think about it as the three of them moved far enough away from the door to avoid blocking the path and Mona set her suitcase down.

Mona and Gezki shared one more goodbye, a quick one that just reinforced all of the things that they'd already said, and then Gezki left the backpack sitting beside them on a mostly dry patch of sidewalk and headed off for the parking garage where she'd left her truck. Mona turned back towards Radko, who surprised her by immediately stepping forward and hugging her, his face turned sideways against her chest and his claws just barely felt as he hugged her uncomfortably tight. As she was still trying to decide whether she should hug him back or disentangle him, he let go on his own, but one of his paws lingered on her right arm. "I'm sorry for everything," he said earnestly, "I don't really know exactly what I've done to upset you, but I'm sorry. I hope we'll stay friends."

Mona fixed a smile on her face, internally confused. How could he be sorry for something if he didn't even know what was bothering her? She gently moved her arm away from his paw, and he let it drop. 

"What can I help with? I can get that backpack? And the duffel bag?"

"Sure." She handed over the duffel bag and waited as he adjusted the strap down so that it was more comfortable for him to carry, but as he was doing so, her phone started chiming.

"What's that?" Radko asked when he saw her frowning at the screen. 

"An alarm I set to tell me that if I haven't left my dorm yet, I'm running late."

"Oh. Well, let's go!"

For the first five minutes of their walk, Radko seemed to clam up. Mona watched him, as she often did, without looking right at him. The expression on his face kept shifting, his manner uncomfortable, as though he wanted to speak but didn't know what to say. They got to the bus stop for the bus that would take them to the train station, and Mona was about to ask him what it was that he wanted to say when the bus pulled around the corner. She sighed silently. Much as she was apprehensive about Radko's feelings and whatever words he was trying to find, she did want to hear him out, at least for his sake. As they got on the bus, she mentally kicked herself for not making time for him until now.

"It really sucks that you're leaving," he said quietly from the bus seat next to her.

"It's the best option I have," she said neutrally.

"Yeah, I know, but... I'm afraid."

"Of what?"

He cast his eyes around at the other mammals in the bus and didn't say anything. After a full minute, he responded in a very quiet voice, "Of missing an opportunity."

Mona lowered her voice to match his. "What opportunity?"

He just shook his head to that, and didn't offer any other response for the rest of the ride. 

When they disembarked at the train station, Radko almost left the duffel bag he'd set down, and had to scramble back onto the bus to grab it. Mona checked the time on her phone as she did; she had about five minutes before embarking started for her train. 

"I'm afraid that you're going to come back and nothing will be the same," Radko said suddenly from next to her. She looked up from her phone and saw that same look on his face that she had noticed earlier, but even more pronounced than before. 

She locked her phone and put it in her pocket. "I'm coming back next fall, and... I don't expect to be any different," she said, not really sure what he wanted to hear or what she wanted to say. 

"I know, but... what if  _ we _ aren't the same?"

Mona sighed and gestured with her head for him to follow as she started walking towards the platform where she'd be embarking. "I don't know what will happen. And I'm not going to promise that everything will go back to being normal between us." At his crestfallen expression, she elaborated, "Because I won't make promises unless I know I can keep them, Radko." 

At that, his ears perked up and he grinned. "That's right, you said that to me once before. And...I appreciate it."

She nodded an acknowledgement. "We might still need to have a talk, and it doesn't seem like a good one to have over text--and I know how you get about phone calls, so it'll have to wait." He smiled sheepishly, but didn't respond, so she carried on. "Whenever I get back... I'll let you know." She paused. "Maybe not immediately, because I'll be coming back to town and immediately moving into the dorms, and it might take me a couple of days to get settled. But... when I'm ready to, I'll... I'll see you." 

He smiled. "Okay."

Mona heard the jist of an announcement that declared it time to embark, and she quickly glanced behind her, where the train's doors were open to mammals getting on. She looked back at Radko. "I need to go."

So quickly that she didn't see it coming, he stepped forward and hugged her again. For a second she, once more, fought with herself over whether to hug him back or make him let go, and then she heard him sniff her audibly, and her mind was made up. She stepped back, forcing him to let go, and didn't meet the hurt look on her face as she held out her hooves. "I need my bags," she reminded him, refusing to acknowledge what had just happened and the different meanings it had for both of them. She didn't have the time to unpack it now. He handed the bags over without a word, and she quickly shouldered each of them. "See you," she said hastily, and turned around to head for the train. 

"Bye, Mona."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys, I swear, we're getting there soon. Don't murder me yet, please!


	29. In Which Mona Returns To Zootopia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for posting so belatedly! The beginning of the semester time has been stealing all of my writing time. Don't worry though, I'm still chugging slowly away.

Mona shut the door, set her luggage down on the floor just inside of it, and surveyed the room. She sighed. She had known what she was getting into when she'd decided to go home for the summer, but the reality of it was still a bit bleak. She tapped a foothoof on the concrete floor of the garage, then picked her way through the space--quite full of stuff that hadn't been touched in a while but for okapi-sized paths that cut through it all--to the couch that had been cleaned off for her, on the wall against the door. The whole place smelled of mildew, but not all that much more than the rainforest in general did. It was cramped, and she would be living out of her suitcase until she unearthed the wardrobe that was rumored to be in the mess somewhere, but the feeling of being back home still made her smile. 

She was halfway through unpacking her essentials, particularly what she'd need to turn the couch into a bed for now, when her mom opened the door that she had just come from. 

"Hi sweetie, your dad just told me you were here. How was your trip?"

Mona crossed the room by the path she'd just taken and hugged her, saying, "It was pretty good. A bit boring, as usual. I napped for easily half of it."

"I bet you needed it, after those finals."

"Yeah, I... did kinda rush off of campus after the last one."

"Well, now you'll have plenty of time to relax."

"Along with cleaning?"

She smiled. "Did you and your dad discuss that in detail?"

"Nope, I was a bit busy at the time."

"Of course, dear. Well, here's the deal, if you want to take it. You clean this place up, and keep track of your hours, and we'll pay you ten bucks an hour for as much work as you do."

Mona flicked an ear. It was a fair wage. "Anything else?"

"We'll give you part of the money for anything you find that we sell, and if you find anything that we don't want to keep but you do want it, we'll probably let you keep it."

"Probably?" 

"Depends on the circumstances. Your father said something about throwing in a bonus if you get the whole place cleaned by the end of summer, but we haven't really talked about that very much just yet. He said that he'd make you up a quick contract before you get started."

"That's doesn't seem necessary."

"Yes, but you know him. He likes to have things official, and document everything. Besides, it couldn't hurt."

Mona smiled. She did indeed know her dad's ways. 

  
  


Mona waffled on the idea for two weeks, but then applied for a few jobs at local places that she thought might be hiring for the summer. The garage, though quite full, clearly wasn't going to be enough to last until fall if she worked at it every day, and she was eager to return to Zootopia with as much money as she could reasonably save up, even if it meant having a rather busy summer. 

She thought often of Radko, though she tried not to dwell on him too much. Still, her irritation with him faded before long. Back at home, among all the memories that she had made in her adolescent and teenage years, her thoughts bounced between memories of how she had been around some of her past crushes and how Radko had been behaving with her, and she found herself sympathising with--though not entirely forgiving--his sketchy behavior. Though less than a year younger than she, he still seemed quite young in comparison, and she reflected that growing up in such unstable circumstances was sure to have set him back when it came to learning how to be an adult and learning how to behave around relationships. That, combined with the uncertainty of their situation--for she had neither returned his feelings nor completely rejected him--had to have him chasing his thoughts in circles trying to find a way to make it work. 

Still, she did not attempt to reach out to him in any meaningful way. Between her job at a local coffee shop--she'd been a shoo-in when they saw her experience with the one she'd worked at in Zootopia--and working to untangle the garage, she kept her body and mind busy. Though she reflected on the state in which she and Radko were, she did not think of him for long at a time. She found it easier not to. She had yet to find in her heart any feelings for him that seemed like they could be more than friendship, and she doubted that she could ever find him attractive, their species being so different. Still, she was aware of the looks she'd seen in his eyes, and the depth of the feeling behind them, and she cared for him too much to crush his hopes in any way but the gentlest possible. It simply wasn't something that could be said in any other way than to his face. 

Still, Mona tried to keep up a casual correspondence. She would text him at least once a week--she made a point of it--with something more than small talk to say. Usually, it was to share something that she had found in the garage that she thought he might be intrigued by. He responded normally enough, but there was a certain weight--sometimes even a melancholy--to his texts that had not been there before. Their conversations were usually brief; there was only so much they could talk to each other before their thoughts would drift back to the conversation that would come eventually, but it was not brought up once throughout the summer. Mona knew better, and she knew that Radko did too. 

  
  


"So, on a scale from one to ten, how excited are you to be coming back?"

"Hmmmm... seven."

"Only seven?" Gezki's voice was incredulous, even through the tinniness of Mona's phone speakers. "Don't tell me you, of all mammals, think you're gonna be homesick."

"Nah, probably not. This summer has even fun, though. And I'm just... I'm not really looking forward to having that talk with Radko."

"Ah, yeah. That."

"Mhmm."

There was silence on the line for a moment, but then Gezki tapped on the back of her phone--a habit she did so often that Mona recognized the sound without having to think about it--and said, "I think it will go okay, honestly I do."

"What makes you say that?"

"Well, it's obvious he cares for you and you care for him. Maybe not in quite the same way, but you're both good mammals who don't want to hurt each other. I'm sure it'll be fine in the end."

Mona grunted an agreement, but didn't try to continue the conversation. With just three days until her train ride back to Zootopia, she had been telling herself on a daily basis not to overthink about it. Conversations like this, she knew she couldn't exactly plan ahead for, but she had the itch to try anyway. 

"So, do you have your roommate lined up for this semester?"

Mona made a face, even though she knew that Gezki couldn't see it. "Actually, no. Lilac asked me if I'd like to room with her again, and I said sure. But the mammals in charge of housing are trying to place her in the medium-small dorms, not medium-large with me. She's decided to argue her case instead of letting them do it, so... There's a good chance that we won't know for sure until move-in day. She says this isn't the first time she's had issues with housing."

"She likes being your roommate that much, huh?"

Mona, suspicious of her words, said, "Hey, I think I make a pretty decent roommate!"

"I'm not saying you don't, love," Gezki said, and Mona could hear her eyes rolling. "I'm just surprised that she'd go to the effort. I would think she'd be more comfortable in a space of the right size for her, around mammals she doesn't have to crane her neck to look at."

Mona shrugged to herself. "Maybe she's had bad roommates in past and doesn't want to risk getting another one. I don't know. She didn't really give much of a reason."

"To each their own, I guess. Hey, you'll get to see my new place!"

"I saw it right before finals, remember?"

"Yeah, but that's when I had just moved in. I've got it all nested out, now. It's very cosy."

"So you mean that I won't fit in it at all, now."

Gezki tapped her phone. "Probably not," she admitted. 

"I had to duck to fit last time, and my ears were still brushing the ceiling." 

"Well, my rent is half what it was. Your tall ass will just have to deal."

Mona laughed. "Don't worry, I'll still come over for tea. And I'll only complain a little bit."

"You'd better!"

  
  


Mona paused outside of the dorm door to set her suitcase down. She reached into her pocket for the key, but then paused when she realized that she was hearing noises from inside. Her roommate must already be inside. She blinked when she realized that, in the fuss of getting ready to return to Zootopia, she had forgotten to confirm with Lilac whether they would be roommates again. 

She left the key in her pocket and opted to knock instead.

“Hello?”

A small hope died in Mona’s chest. The voice most certainly wasn’t Lilac’s. Still, she knew Lilac was on campus somewhere, and they could always hang out when they had the free time. She put on a smile as she heard the doorknob start to turn. 

“Hello?” The voice was less cautious, but no less questioning, as the mammal inside opened the door and saw Mona standing there. She was a tapir, though Mona wasn’t sure exactly what species, and she was dressed plainly and wore glasses much larger than her eyes.

“Hi, I’m Mona. I believe I’m your new roommate,” Mona said, offering a hoof to shake. 

“I’m Sarah,” she said, with a small smile barely visible behind her trunk. Greetings done, Mona picked up her suitcase and Sarah stepped away from the door to let her in.  

They made small, get-to-know-you talk as Mona worked on unpacking. She learned that Sarah was a Zootopia native, a sophomore, and was an engineering student. Mona thought that she seemed nice enough, but she was soft-spoken and didn’t seem terribly interested in talking; every response was brief, but not so abrupt as to give Mona the impression that she wanted the conversation to end.

Halfway through putting her sheet on her bed, Mona stopped abruptly when she realized that her phone was buzzing. Sarah stopped talking when she heard it, and so Mona offered a quick apology and pulled out her phone to see who was calling. 

She grinned when she saw the name. “Sorry,” she said quickly to Sarah, “I need to take this, but I’ll step out so I don’t bother you.”

Without waiting for a response, she quickly stepped out of the dorm and closed the door behind her as she answered the call. “Hey, Gez,” she said, heading down the hall to find somewhere less awkward to hang out as they talked, “What’s up?”

  
  


“ _ This  _ is your favorite coffee shop?” Gezki pushed the door open and looked around, clearly not very impressed.

“Don’t tell me I’ve never brought you here?”

Gezki flicked an ear. “It’s not like I visit you on campus all that often.”

Mona just shrugged. They were both standing just inside the door, looking around, and so Mona offered, “Little mammal’s choice of seating.”

Gezki laughed. “Oh, don’t you give me that. You know I’ll abuse it.”

Mona just shrugged again, smiling down at her, so Gezki threw up her paws and said, “Okay, but I warned you,” and lead the way towards the counter to make her order. 

Ten minutes later, they were seated at a small, tall table by the window on two stools. Gezki’s footpaws couldn’t touch the ground, but she usually sat with them drawn up onto her seat anyway, so it seemed to suit her fine. Mona found the seat of the stool to be just a little small, but it was nothing she couldn’t sit at for a while. 

For the better part of an hour, they sat sipping coffee and catching up. As they did, Mona found herself feeling better, more relaxed, and more awake. She could easily blame the awakeness on the coffee, but the rest, she knew was because she was back in Zootopia, sitting across from her best friend, right where she belonged.

“You know,” she mused during a lull in their conversation, “I think Zootopia is starting to feel more like home than Fioli.”

Gezki grinned a toothy grin, and for a moment Mona was reminded strongly of Radko’s toothy grins. “Yeah,” she said, “I’m glad you’ve gotten to that point. It took me a little while, too, but it’s a great feeling, isn’t it?”

“Absolutely.”

“Speaking of feelings,” Gezki said, the expression on her face a little more sly than before, “When are you going to have that talk with Radko?”

Mona groaned. “I don’t know. I just got back, and I want to... think about it just a little more before I do.”

“Well, don’t put it off for too long. That kind of thing can sour if you don’t take care of it.”

“I know, I know.”

Gezki watched her face for a moment with no particular expression, and then grabbed her paper cup and downed the last gulp of coffee from the bottom of it. “So!” She said with an abruptness that made it clear she was changing this subject on purpose, “You going to show me your new dorm room?”

Mona cocked an ear. “It’s probably about the same as the room I had last year?”

Gezki shrugged. “Well, I’ll walk you back so you can at least show me where it is. That way, when you’re drowning in homework, I can come throw you a sugary-snack-based lifeline.”

Mona couldn’t help but laugh at that. “Okay, you win,” she said, standing up. Gezki hopped down from her stool, and they headed for the door, tossing their empty cups into the trash can beside it as they left. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter brings Radko back!


	30. In Which They Finally Have The Talk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SO GUESS WHAT. My writing motivation has been a little lower recently (hence the slower updates, oops), especially since I've temporarily given up on 4thewords, which is for some reason my kryptonite. I can write in google docs and make things happen, but 4thewords kicks my motivation right in the pants and I get so much done when I'm using it. Unfortunately, though, the current 4thewords is rather awful on mobile, which is where I do a lot of my writing, so I have switched away from using it these last few months. 
> 
> HOWEVER, 4thewords is about to have a huge update on Oct 3! They promise a massive amount of interface redesign, lots of new features to make writers' lives easier, and most importantly (for me) they are saying that the mobile experience is going to be SO MUCH BETTER. AND Y'ALL. I AM SO EXCITED. I CAN'T WAIT FOR THE THIRD.
> 
> Anyway, once that update comes out, I sincerely HOPE that I will hop back in the writing saddle with gusto and be able to start updating with the frequency I started out with. I hate making you guys wait. I hate making myself wait. 
> 
> See the end notes for more reasons why I think updates will be more frequent soon :)

A polite knock came from the door, and Mona didn’t look up from her textbook as Sarah sprang up to go answer it. In spite of her quiet, reserved ways around Mona--for she had shown no increased friendliness or talkativeness in the two weeks since they had met--she had many friends, who dropped by their dorm often and usually without warning. 

Sarah opened the door, and Mona was halfway through tuning her out when she caught, “Oh, you’re not Daniel.”

“Er, nope? I’m Radko.”

Mona’s ears shot up and she turned, laying a hoof on the book so she wouldn’t lose her place. There, as much as she could see him in the doorway around Sarah, was Radko, in the fur. Sarah turned to look back at her, and Radko leaned just slightly to see around her. A sheepish grin broke out on his face, and he gave a tiny wave with one paw. “Hi Mona.” 

“Hi.”

“Would you, uh, happen to have a few minutes? I can come back if you’re busy,” he said quickly.

“No, it’s okay. I do have a few minutes.”

  
  


Radko was dressed very nicely. He had on a collared, short-sleeved shirt that she had never seen before, nicer jeans than she knew he owned, and he had his mane cut shorter than normal and combed into submission so it laid smoothly along his head and neck. 

Mona sipped the carrot juice mix he had brought her. It was the nice stuff, more expensive but also more delicious than the generic brand she occasionally bought, and it came in a glass bottle with a long neck that she could comfortably wrap her hoof around. It was that crisp kind of cold that made her think that Radko had probably bought it only minutes before showing up at her door. 

She lowered the bottle, reminding herself not to drink it all at once. Radko, walking beside her on the wide campus sidewalk, veered to avoid a passing mammal, but carefully didn’t bump into Mona either.

It felt strange to her, to finally be in the same space as him again, and that in itself was strange. She was used to being near him.

Or she had been, anyway.

“Is it much further?”

“Just around this corner,” she said, gesturing to the right as they passed around one of the campus’s many fake-tree-lecture-hall buildings. Through an archway that had two species of vine growing on it, they stepped off of the concrete sidewalk and onto a narrow path made of stones, sunk deep into the moss of a dense garden, just off the normal path. Radko fell back to let her lead. They probably would have both fit on it side by side if they had tried, but Mona appreciated him letting her go first; she still wasn’t entirely sure how she felt about him being in her space. 

“Whoa,” Radko said, looking around, “I didn’t even know this place was here.”

“I didn’t know about it until late last semester.” She gestured to one of the buildings they were between, barely visible through the garden’s dense plants. “That’s one of the agricultural department’s buildings, and there’s another up ahead you can’t see from here. They have the nicest garden on campus, but there usually isn’t anyone here except for maybe the mammals tending it.”

“Nice. I see why you wanted to come here. Better than asking your roommate to step out. She probably would have wondered.”

“Probably. Besides, I think she was expecting someone to show up soon.”

Radko snickered. “‘You’re not Daniel,’” he quoted cheekily.

Mona snorted. “Yeah. I never know when one of her friends is going to show up.”

“Sounds a little... inconvenient.”

“It’s not as bad as it could be, but I’m probably going to start doing more of my studying in the library.” She paused next to a bench, one of several of various sizes that were scattered around the garden. It was surrounded by flower bushes, but it was the right size for them, and Mona didn’t see anyone around at all. “This okay?”

“This is great.” 

Mona sat down on the bench, towards one end but not as far down as she could be, and Radko sat near the other end. There was easily enough room between them for a larger mammal to sit down as well, which surprised Mona a little. She was more used to Radko sitting right next to her. 

For a moment there was silence between them, and Mona was a little afraid that she’d have to prompt him.  _ You’re the one who wanted to have a talk _ , she found herself thinking,  _ so talk. _

“So, um, first of all, I want to... apologize.” Mona’s ears flicked forwards at that. “I’ve had all summer to think about... what happened, with the fur club and afterwards. I wasn’t thinking straight--wasn’t really thinking at all, to be honest--and I behaved badly.” He was trying to meet her eyes, but his gaze kept defaulting to the surrounding plants instead. “I didn’t really realize how all of that must have felt for you. Especially since that’s when you realized...” he closed his eyes, his voice dropping with the effort of making himself say the words, “That I have feelings for you.” He let out a deep breath and opened his eyes, and Mona wondered how much effort it had taken him to make himself actually say it. 

“And then, I was too pushy, trying to get you to talk to me about it afterwards. It was... it wasn’t a good situation, all around, and I’m sorry that I put you into it.” He finally met her eyes and tried to offer a smile, but it looked almost painful. 

“It’s...” Mona stopped herself from saying ‘okay,’ because she still wasn’t sure that it  _ was _ . She suspected that she’d need to think for a while before she knew just how she felt about the whole situation. She paused until she found the right response, and then said, “Thank you, for that. You’re right that it was uncomfortable for me, but... I’m sorry for being so standoffish to you about the whole thing. The timing wasn’t good, but there really wasn’t any reason this conversation couldn’t have happened last spring, before I left.”

Radko’s grin showed almost all of his teeth, but Mona was so used to the sight that it no longer gave her pause. “Honestly, I’m kinda glad you made us wait. I probably would have fucked it all up, if I hadn’t had all summer to think.” For a moment he leaned towards her, almost as though he was about to stand, but then he settled back into the bench as before.

They sat for a moment, each smiling, but then Radko cleared his throat and fixed his eyes on the ground. “Anyway, I... I get it now, why you were so upset. I’m not going to ever do anything like that to you again. I don’t ever want to push you away like that.”

Mona smiled. “Thank you,” she said, and then quickly added, “You’re forgiven. You... did made a couple of bad judgements, but I won’t hold it against you, going forward.”

“Thank you.”

Again silence reigned for a moment, broken only by Radko taking in and letting out a deep breath, a subtle release of tension. Mona reflected that waiting for this conversation must have been even more nerve-wracking for him than it had been for her.

“So, Mona.”

She refocused her eyes on his face and saw expectation in it, so she said, “Yes?”

“Could I... er, maybe convince you to go on a date with me?”

Mona sucked in a small breath. Though she was not surprised that he would try to ask, she had certainly not expected it so soon. She scrambled to find a response for a moment, and then heaved a sigh. “Radko, I don’t really think that’s a good idea.”

He cocked his head, ears and eyes on her but patience in his expression. “Why is that?”

Mona wasn’t quite sure how to answer, but his expression didn’t change and he didn’t try to prompt her, so she took a moment to sort her thoughts into words. 

“I’ve never really thought about you that way,” she said at last. “I have never been attracted to a predator. I don’t know if I could be. I wouldn’t want to get into a relationship unless I am certain I wanted it. And I wouldn’t want to lead you on like that.”

He nodded, his expression pensive. “I get that,” he said quietly, but then offered a charming smile. “Still, hear me out? If you still want to say no, then I won’t ask again.”

Mona felt apprehensive, but she couldn’t deny the request. “Okay.”

He leaned forward a little, elbows on his knees, and grasped one of his paws with the other. “All I’m asking for is one date. I... well, I realize that you haven’t ever seen me as more than a friend, but that’s what dates are for, right? To spend some time together and think about whether you’d like to be with each other. I wouldn’t expect it to progress to a relationship, or even expect a second date. I wouldn’t expect us to act like a couple or anything, I know it’s too early for that. All I want is for you to give me one chance, and have a good time.”

Mona mulled it over. Radko was watching her face, but without pressure behind his gaze, so again she took a moment to contemplate what he’d said. 

When she refocused on his face, she saw earnesty in his eyes. He was being sincere, if not entirely truthful. She knew that he would want another date, would want things to progress, and that he would probably have some difficulty settling for being her friend. That difficulty might be exacerbated if she said yes.

Nonetheless, she felt quite certain that he would not let any of that drive a rift between them. He had convinced her that, whatever he felt, he was done acting on his feelings when he knew they were unwanted. 

“Sure,” she said, feeling herself smile a little when his face lit up. “One date it is, then. Why not?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELLO FRIENDS WE HAVE MADE IT TO A TURNING POINT. A DATE HAS BEEN AGREED ON. HOLY SHIT DID YOU EVER THINK THIS DAY WOULD COME???
> 
> I'm a little surprised I'm still writing, because A) I had no intention of making this work this long and involved and B) I didn't expect it to take this long for them to get to this point, but... I'm happy with how it's going, and I'm still having fun and chugging away, so I think we're going to get this thing finished some day!
> 
> In other news, I am, as usual, a few chapters ahead in writing compared to posting. Sorry to hold out on you guys, but I really feel better about the quality of work I can put out when I maintain a buffer. :) Anyway, this is the other reason I think I'll be updating more frequently: THE FIRST KISS HAS BEEN WRITTEN. THEY FINALLY GOT THERE. Soon I will get to write a bunch of fun parts that I really have been looking forward to, which has me excited for LOTS OF PROGRESS. WOO. ALSO LOTS OF CAPITAL LETTERS. 
> 
> Anyway, how are you guys feeling about all this? We're getting so close to actual relationship material. Do you hate me for stringing you along for 70,000+ words? Do you eat slow burn for sustenance? Do you wish I would be less long-winded? Are you still pissed at Mona and Radko for being assholes in the last couple chapters?
> 
> For that matter, how's your day been? I like talking with you guys. Tell me how you're feeling in the comments :D


	31. In Which They Go On A Date

Mona stepped out of the door to her dorm building. She glanced around just in time to see Radko straighten up from where he’d been leaning against the wall. 

“Hello,” she said, offering a friendly smile as he padded up to her.

“Hi Mona. You look nice,” he said, giving her a quick once-over. 

“Thank you.” She found herself a little glad that he had noticed; she’d considered dressing casually, but she had decided to put just a little more effort in, and had picked her nicest capris and a shirt that was a little more blousey and dressy than her usual t-shirts. Though she didn’t really expect to find herself falling for Radko, she suspected that she would have had more to lose by not taking their dates seriously. If she was dismissive, she might invite resentment from him, and she was not interested in losing him as a friend. 

Mona half expected him to try to hold her hoof as they walked to the bus station, but he didn’t. He had the thumb of one paw hooked in his pants pocket and occasionally gesticulated with the other paw as he talked, but the polite distance between them remained. She was relieved. She had enough to feel awkward about without him getting in her space. 

  
  


“How did you learn about this place?”

Radko chuckled. “I went there once, with a friend, when I was twelve.” He shrugged idly, and added, “I haven’t been back since, so... I hope I remember it well enough and it’ll still be fun.”

Mona turned an ear around. “Are you sure it’s still even open?”

He grinned. “I Zoogled it, don’t worry. It may have changed a little, but it’s definitely still there.”

They disembarked from the bus, and Mona immediately felt the heat. It was the first week in September, and Savannah Central was still much warmer than the Rainforest district. Radko noticed her seeking the shade of a nearby awning as he checked the map on his phone. 

“A little warm for you?” he asked, stepping into the shade next to her.

“It is warm, but I’ll be fine.”

He smiled. “I’ll get us some water when we get in there.”

“That would be nice.”

“Well, we just have to walk that way for a few blocks,” he said cheerfully, pointing. “Shall we?”

The little park had an archway entrance, but the lettering on it was faded almost to the point of being illegible. There was a printed banner hanging from it that was much newer, but had clearly been beaten on by the hot sun for at least one summer. 

At the gate just beyond the archway, they stood in a short line that seemed to mostly consist of young adult mammals, though there were a couple of young calves up near the front of the line. Their admission was two dollars each--paid for by Radko--taken by a bored-looking zebra in a slightly wrinkled uniform. 

Just beyond the gate, they paused to look around. 

“There’s a concession stand, I bet they’d have water,” Radko said, pointing to a tiny building off to the right, where a rabbit’s ears were barely visible behind a cash register on the counter. 

“Probably.”

They walked up to the stand--there was only one other customer, so they only had a minute to look at the chalkboard menu before they were up. 

“Two bottles of water, medium, please.” Radko looked back and up at Mona as the rabbit at the register punched a few buttons. “Would you like anything else to drink? Or a snack?”

Mona paused, then shook her head. “We can always come back later.”

“True. Okay, just the waters, please.”

“Six dollars, please.”

Radko promptly passed his debit card over, and a moment later he was handing Mona a plastic water bottle. The cheap plastic crinkled loudly as she unscrewed the cap to take a drink, but the water was crisply cold. After she put the cap back on, she made sure to hold it in her shadow so it wouldn’t get warm too quickly. 

Water acquired, Radko lead the way into the park proper. All around them were the signs of the age of the place; paint was faded and even flaking in places, the river pebble gravel had sunk so far into the dirt that it was barely visible in places, and the style of every building, every sign, and every fancy decoration was just... not quite modern. Still, the place had its charm. 

“There aren’t a lot of mammals here,” she observed as they walked past some other little concession stands, selling candy and popcorn and deep-fried snacks. Around them, she saw only about twice as many visitors as there were workers, and only a few children among them. “I would have expected to see more children,” she added.

“Well, there’s a reason I was trying so hard to make sure that we came on a weekday morning. I figured we’d have a better time when most of the kids are in school.”

Mona smiled. “I almost forgot about that,” she said quietly. Radko’s fuzzy ears both swiveled towards her at once, and she spoke up slightly as she added, “It’s funny, I’ve barely been out of high school two years, and it already seems so far away. Sometimes I almost forget that school was... a  _ thing _ .”

Radko huffed out a tiny laugh. “Yeah, it does seem long,” he said quietly, more to himself than to her.

For a minute, they walked in comfortable silence. Beyond the concession stands they passed into a mini golf course, and though they each looked around at the courses and the decorations, neither made the suggestion that they play. 

“Oh, hey!” Radko made an aborted gesture as though he was about to grab her arm, but never completed the motion. “Look,” he said, plowing on, “Carnival games!”

Just past the last part of the mini golf course, to the left of the path they were on, there was a little round area ringed by carnival game stands. Radko looked at her, grinning. “Man, I was so bad at these as a kid, but I loved them. You wanna play?”

“Sure, that seems fun.”

  
  


“You know,” Mona remarked as they walked away from the third carnival game, “You don’t have to pay for everything.”

Radko shrugged. “The way I see it, I’m the one who asked  _ you _ on this date, so... it makes sense that I’m the one who should pay for stuff.” Though his words sounded certain, Radko looked at the ground as he spoke, and his paw clenched around the plush penguin he’d won from one of the games. “In a way, you’re doing me a favor. So, I might as well return it.” He smiled up at her, but it was an ears-down smile, and though Mona wasn’t quite sure what he was feeling, she felt a little of the apprehension in him, and thought that she might sympathize. She’d been close enough to his position--so close to being with the mammal he wanted to be with, but at the same time so far--that she felt she could guess at the warring emotions he’d been going through the last several times she’d seen him. 

“Well, the way I see it,” she said, keeping her tone light and looking ahead--though of course she saw his ears prick towards her--as they kept going down the path, “You’re doing  _ me _ a favor, too.” She looked at him for a moment, offered a small smile at his cocked head, and then looked ahead and continued, her voice lowered. “I see how hard you’re trying. You’re putting in all this effort, and even though you know that I might not be able to give you what you want.” She saw him start to open his mouth, and hastily kept going before he could interrupt, “But you’re doing it with... a lot more grace than I honestly would have thought you were capable of. And I appreciate that. So, thank you.”

Radko laughed and shook his head, his expression sheepish. “I’m glad it’s working. I didn’t want to drive you off again.” 

“Well, don’t worry.”

He grinned up at her, and Mona smiled back down at him. 

“C’mon,” Radko said suddenly, gesturing in the general direction they’d already been going, “Let’s go check out the rides.”

  
  


Mona unlocked the door to her dorm quietly and stepped inside, glancing around. Everything was mostly as she’d left it, except for Sarah, who was absent. She breathed a tiny sigh of relief. Maybe Sarah--and her unannounced friends--would stay gone for the evening and give her a little time alone to reflect. 

Mona set down her phone, wallet and the little plush penguin that Radko had insisted she keep, then took stock of her desk and its contents. She had some reading due monday, but no other homework that was at all urgent, so she decided to take a little time to relax instead. 

Not, she reflected, that she was terribly likely to have the focus for dry sociological readings anyway. 

She turned on her lamp, turned off the room light, collected her laptop from the desk, and settled back on her bed with it and her phone. 

She pulled up Nutflix, found something fairly mindless to put on, and then set her laptop down against the wall on her bed to play. She turned her attention to her phone, ignoring the show’s intro. 

She had a couple of notifications from apps, mostly emails that she didn’t really care to check, so she just swiped them all away. The one notification she did care about was a text from Gezki, which she opened. 

_ Have fun, let me know how it went! _

It was from just twenty minutes after she’d left with Radko. A soft smile on her muzzle, she typed back:  _ It was actually pretty okay. _

She set her phone down, but then changed her mind and immediately picked it back up. She opened up her text messages again and switched to her conversation with Radko, then stared at it for a moment. Once she finally decided what to type, she quickly tapped out:  _ Thanks for the good time today. It’s nice to be back to normal with you, even if it feels a little weird to be going on dates.  _

A few minutes later, her phone buzzed, and she checked the response from Gezki.  _ Just okay?  _

She nibbled on her lip while trying to decide how to explain.  _ I had a good time. It went better than I thought it would go. Still don’t know about the whole thing, but he was very nice about it. _

Before she even had a chance to put her phone down, Radko replied:

_ Dates? Does that mean I get another one? ;) _

And as she was trying to figure out how to respond to that, he sent,  _ Seriously though, thank you so much for giving me a chance. I promise I’ll do my best to not fuck it up. And I would really like to go out with you again some time, if you’ll have me. _

Mona set her phone down and looked at the Nutflix show, but without any attention for what was happening on the screen. She went over what she knew of Radko in her mind, her thoughts about him, and who he was to her. Not that long ago, she had been so certain that he was just a friend to her, and would never be anything else. Yet here she was, letting herself be talked into dates with a mammal who she had no desire to so much as kiss. 

She looked over at the penguin on her desk, then leaned over far enough to grab it and sat back holding it in her hooves. Her laptop completely forgotten, she turned the toy over and over, inspecting it idly as she thought. It was very cartoonish, with big blue eyes and purple fake fur, loosely stuffed. It was a cheap thing, but that was normal for game prizes. Still, its fur was exceptionally soft. 

She was startled out of her thoughts by her phone buzzing again, and she set the penguin down next to her and picked it up. The buzz turned out to have been another email, but it reminded her that she had not yet texted Radko back. 

_ I’m still not sure about all this, but as long as you’re still okay with getting turned down in the future, then I’ll go on another date with you. _

His next text began with three grinning canine furmoji, and then read,  _ I picked the activity for the first one, would you like to choose what we do this time? _

Mona couldn’t help but laugh at his enthusiasm. She scratched her nose as she went through a mental list of the things she enjoyed doing, trying to think of one that would be a good pair activity.  _ Do you like bowling? _

His reply was quick this time:  _ I’ve never played. Is it fun? _

Mona raised her eyebrows at that.  _ Never been bowling?  _ She paused before writing more. The words ‘Did you even have a childhood?’ crossed her mind, but she decided that that might be insensitive. Instead, she typed out,  _ Well, then let me introduce you. I’ll do some zoogling until I find a place that looks good. _

_ That sounds great, I’m excited to try it :) _

Mona set her phone down and turned her attention back to her laptop. She had tuned out almost the entire episode, so she pulled it closer to her long enough to set the progress bar back to just after the intro, then set her laptop back down where she’d left it before. This time she watched it, attention focused on the screen, her hooves idly feeling the texture of the little toy penguin that she had absently moved back into her lap.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The 4thewords update is out!!!
> 
> For anyone who hasn't heard of it before, 4thewords is a website that makes writing into a sort of browser-based RPG. You travel through a fantasy world and battle monsters by writing words, and try to keep your writing streak going for as long as possible. 
> 
> It's a great deal of fun, and I absolutely recommend you guys check it out--but maybe wait a couple of weeks for post-relaunch bugs to get squashed, because they're a bit crazy now. Don't worry, I'll yell about it more in the future (and post my referral code once the website settles down a little!)


	32. In Which They Go Bowling

Radko was panting, his tongue hanging out a little, though every other minute he would lick his lips and close his mouth for a moment as though he wanted to will himself to stop. Mona was hiding her amusement. It was a warm, humid day in the rainforest; the sun was out, but it had rained heavily the previous night, and Radko was not dressed for the weather. Savannah central was not as tightly climate-controlled as the rainforest district, and so even though it was only September, Radko was wearing a long-sleeved shirt and long pants.

Remembering their interaction three weeks ago outside of the little amusement park, she looked at him and grinned. “A little warm for you?”

“Ha!” He stuck his tongue out at her. “A little,” he admitted, and winked.

Mona smiled. “We’re almost there,” she assured. 

“Good. I wouldn’t want to ruin this ‘do before the date’s even started,” he said, gesturing to his mane, which was gelled into a high, elegant swoop. 

Mona shook her head as he laughed at his own statement. “Of course not,” she said gamely. 

  
  


Radko preceded Mona into the bowling alley, and his ears went up the moment they stepped through the door. As he paused two steps inside, Mona paused behind him and waited patiently. Distantly, they could both hear the sounds of balls rolling down lanes--faint enough that Mona doubted that was what he was listening to--followed by the loud crashing noises of pins being knocked down, at a few different pitches because they were at a multi-scale alley. 

“Sorry,” Radko said, moving forward, apparently having realized that he’d been standing in front of the door, “I’ve only ever heard that sound in movies, it feels a little odd to hear it in real life.”

Mona couldn’t help but smile. “Don’t apologize,” she said gently. 

This particular bowling alley had nothing but a sloped hallway, almost fifty feet in length, leading straight back from the front door. Once Radko started moving again, Mona could see the apprehension in his ears.

“Weird hallway, huh?” She commented.

“Very. What’s up with it?”

“The whole place is underground, but other than that, I’m not sure why they didn’t just... have an elevator. Or some stairs.”

Radko cocked his ears even harder, looking up at her instead of the patterned carpet on the walls. “Underground, huh?”

Mona shrugged. “Every bowling alley I’ve been in is windowless anyway, so why not?”

In a few more feet, they left the hallway and found themselves next to a large desk-counter that came up to Radko’s nose, just high enough to be awkward. A capybara was sitting behind it, sporting that extremely bored look that most capybaras seemed to have as a resting face.

“Welcome to Speedy Sliders, do you need shoe rentals?”

Radko blinked, but Mona answered immediately, “Yes.”

“Size and type?”

“Ungulate medium-large for me.”

The capybara turned to Radko, who just said “Uhh...”

“Canine something, maybe?” Mona suggested to him.

“Step back a pace or two,” The capybara said, getting up from the tall chair behind the register and stepping directly onto the counter to peer over it at Radko’s feet. “Looks like canine medium to me. You can always switch them out at no extra charge if you need to.” Stepping back into the chair and resuming their squatted seat in it, the capybara turned their attention to the register. “You two going to be using the house’s balls today?”

Radko tried hard to conceal a snort, but Mona caught it. Giving no indication that she had, she said “Yes,” with a straight face.

“How many games?”

“Can we start with one?”

“Sure. Just come see me again if you want to play any more.” The capybara’s bored tone never left their voice. They hit a few buttons on the register--which was so old that it was barely even electric--and then peered at them over it. “That will be twenty dollars even.”

Radko immediately reached into his pocket, but Mona set a hoof on his shoulder. “It’s on me,” she said, pulling her wallet out, and handed over her debit card before he could argue. He shrugged and left his paws in his pockets.

The capybara set Mona’s receipt on the counter in front of her, then turned around and stepped down from the chair. Though Mona couldn’t see much below the height of the counter, she realized that there was a stepladder right next to the tall chair to allow the capybara to get into and out of it without having to jump. A moment later, just as she was pocketing the receipt, the capybara reappeared above the counter with two pairs of bowling shoes, which were dropped unceremoniously onto the counter. “Lane seven.”

“Thank you,” Mona said, grabbing her shoes and nudging Radko when he just stared at his. 

“Have a nice day.”

As they walked around the divider and over to the seating just behind lane seven, Radko held up his bowling shoes. “What the hell are these?” he murmured to her. 

“Bowling shoes.”

He lifted a sarcastic lip to show her one fang, though he was clearly smiling behind it. “No shit. Why do you need shoes to bowl?”

Mona shrugged. “They have special soles, I think.” She sat down on a bench seat just behind their assigned lane and started undoing the velcro on her bowling shoes. Radko sat beside her and watched her for a moment, then started picking at the velcro on his, clearly unsure what to do about it.

“Here,” she said, abandoning her shoes for a moment and sliding off the bench, onto her knees on the carpeted floor. “Let me see that.”

She was not practiced at dealing with bowling shoes--it had been a couple of years since she’d even played--but she was able to untangle the velcro straps on one of his shoes. She took ahold of his ankle, positioned the bottom of the shoe against the bottom of his foot--it fit well enough--and then said, “Hold this in place.”

“These are so weird.”

Mona just shrugged as she got to work wrapping the straps around his foot and ankle. “You can buy ones that are shaped like your actual paw, but they’re more expensive than these, and not as adjustable. Most alleys have this kind of shoe so that they don’t have to own as many pairs.”

“This is more like a sandal than a shoe.”

Mona shrugged again. “As long as it will stay on your foot without hurting, then you should be good to go.” She finished with the velcro, and tugged at it a little to check her work. “There you go. How does that feel?”

“Weird.” 

“But not bad?”

“Nah, should be fine.”

“Okay. Can you get the other one?”

“Sure,” he said, grabbing it and starting to work at the velcro, which was all tangled and stuck to itself in a disorganized way. Mona got back to her own shoes, which were awkwardly wide for her hooves, but went on easily enough anyway. By the time she had finished with both of hers, Radko had his other one on and was standing, staring at his feet. 

“Having fun yet?” Mona joked.

He snorted, but then grinned. “Yeah, actually.” Mona flicked an ear, so he added, “Why wouldn’t I be, when I’m with you?”

Blindsided by the comment, Mona just stared at him until he broke eye contact, smiling sheepishly. “Too much?” He asked.

Mona blinked and forced herself to come up with a response. “Sorry, just didn’t expect...” She waved a hoof, not sure how to say it.

He grinned. “It’s fine,” he assured, and then stuck out a footpaw in her direction. “So, my feet feel weird. What next?”

Relieved at the change in topic, she said, “Okay, we need to find a ball that will fit each of us.” She turned and checked over the balls already on the return on their lane. Most of them were too heavy for her, and only one had the right type of grip for her hooves. She hefted it, but found that it was too heavy as well. “None of these fit me,” she said, and then looked at Radko’s paws and started looking through them again. “Maybe this one will fit you? Try putting your fingers in these holes.” As he reached for the ball in question, she hastily added, “And don’t force it. You don’t want to get them stuck.”

Radko looked a little more amused than she would have expected, but he didn’t comment. He tried the ball, but Mona could see that he had to stretch his paw to grip it. He lifted it for a moment, as she had, but then set it back down. “I don’t know what it’s supposed to be like.”

“Here, let go for a moment.” He did, and Mona reached over and spun the ball until she saw the number printed on it. “14C might be a little high for you, let’s see if we can find a lighter one.” 

She grabbed one of the balls off of the rather-full return and headed for the racks behind them, and heard Radko do the same. She set down the one she’d grabbed in a gap, then started looking through the balls on the rack, spinning them to check the numbers. Radko, crouched beside her, was looking too, but she could tell that he was just going through the motions. After a moment, she realized that all of the balls were color-coded by grip type, and then quickly found a purple ball--the canine-grip color--that had a large 10C printed on it.

“Here, take this one,” she said, and spun a couple of balls until she figured out that the ungulate color was green. She found one with 9U printed on it, and tested the grip. It felt comfortable enough. 

Balls secured, they went back to their lane. Mona set hers down on the return, stepped back to let Radko do the same, and then stepped up to the panel. She typed in each of their names on the screen--which was, mercifully, the right type to accept input from her hooves--and then turned to Radko, who was idly turning the other balls sitting on the return.

“Maybe we should get those out of the way, too,” she suggested. “We won’t be using any of them.”

“Sure,” he said cheerfully, and grabbed one ball under each arm. Mona, not trusting her grip as much as he was trusting his, grabbed one at a time. In two trips, they had all but their two balls returned to the racks behind the lanes.

“Okay,” Radko said, stepping up beside the return and looking down the lane, “I’ve seen bowling in movies, but I don’t know how to actually play, so... explain it to me like I’ve never heard of the game.”

Mona smiled. “Sure,” she said. “Grab your ball. I put my name in to go first, but you can go through the motions with me.”

She grabbed the ball she’d chosen and stepped up onto the wooden floor in front of the lanes, and heard Radko’s bowling shoes quietly tap as he stepped up behind her. They both took a few paces forward, and once they were standing alongside each other, she started talking. She explained the names for everything--the lanes, the gutter, the pins, the return--first, and then said, “So you probably know this--”

“No, I don’t know anything, remember?”

Rolling her eyes, she nudged him with her elbow and continued, “But the goal is to knock as many pins down as possible, and the most straightforward way to do that is to hit the one in the front as hard as you can.”

“Okay.”

“Watch what I do closely, because I’m only going to get to do it once or twice before it’s your turn.”

“Once or twice?”

“If you don’t knock down all of the pins on the first try, you get a second roll.”

“Okay.”

Radko stepped back to give her room as she stepped forward and got into position. She was far from an expert, and she knew her form was not perfect, but she felt confident enough to demonstrate. She gave the ball a couple of experimental swings to test the feel of it, then stepped forward quickly and sent it zooming down the lane. 

Her roll, as she guessed it would be, was imperfect. She watched as the ball veered more and more to the left, and by the time it got to the pins, it knocked down only two on the leftmost side before vanishing into the mechanisms behind. She turned to look at Radko, who looked at her and smiled. “I’m guessing it’s harder than it looks?”

“A little, yeah. I always have to get the hang of it all over again when I play. It’s not too bad, though.”

Just as she finished her sentence, Radko’s eyes snapped from her face back onto the lane. “Whoa,” he said, and she turned back around in time to see the still-standing pins lifted into the air, the machine’s arm sweeping the space beneath them to clear any fallen pins.

Mona laughed. “Pretty neat, huh? It’s all automatic.”

“Yeah,” he said, and laughed with her. “It never occured to me that a robot would set up the pins, but it makes sense.”

“Yeah.” Mona heard the return spit out her ball, so she went back and grabbed it, then returned to where she’d been standing. “Okay, here goes again.”

Her second roll was better, though it was still off-center, and she left five pins standing. They both watched as the robot arm swept the remaining pins away, then set up a fresh set of ten. 

“There we go,” she said, pointing to the scoreboard overhead. “Now it’s your turn.”

“Okay,” he said, looking a little nervous. He stepped forward, and Mona stayed two paces behind him. 

“Feel free to swing the ball a few times before you let go.”

Radko did so, and Mona stepped up closer behind his left. “Turn your body a little more,” she said, nudging his shoulder, “You’re swinging it really close to your knee.”

Flashing her a grin over his shoulder, he did so. 

“Ready?”

“I guess so.”

“Go ahead, then.”

Mona stepped back to give him room, and he stepped forward to release the ball. He let go a little late in his swing, making the ball fly into the air and then drop onto the lane with a loud  _ thud, _ after which it rolled down the lane at a pretty decent speed. She stepped up beside him to watch it as it veered to the right. Almost to the pins, it dropped into the gutter and rolled out of sight.

“Damn,” Radko said, and breathed a tiny laugh.

“That’s okay, you should have seen my first try.” 

He smiled up at her. “Any tips?”

“Try to swing the ball a little lower, and let go when it’s almost touching the floor. If it drops onto the lane, it loses speed.”

“Okay,” he said, an ear flicking curiously. “How about staying out of the gutter?”

“That just takes practice to figure out your aim.” She gestured to the ball return as she heard the quiet  _ thunk _ of it delivering his ball. “There you go, time for your second try.”

He grinned as he went and picked it up. “Look out pins,” he said cheerfully, “I’ll hit you sooner or later.”

His second roll hit only a single pin, once again too far to the right, but on his second turn, he knocked down six of the pins on his first try. The second went right through the gap left by the first, and he laughed at that. “You’re right, this is harder than it looks.”

“You’re getting the hang of it.”

“Yeah” he said agreeably, “This is fun. Thanks for bringing me here.”

“You’re welcome.”

For a moment their eyes met, and Mona found herself arrested. The expression on Radko’s face was soft and gentle, but full of joy, and his smile lit up just a little brighter when he looked at her, and she suddenly found herself wondering if there was any way she  _ could _ fall for him. 

She was not falling yet, of that she was sure; she had had enough crushes and enough dates to be familiar with that feeling. Still, it was impossible to deny that Radko’s enthusiasm was endearing. 

He reached out with his footpaw and nudged the toe of her bowling shoe with the toe of his own, breaking her from her thoughts. “It’s your turn,” he said gently, and Mona blinked. 

“Right, it is. Thanks,” she said, and quickly turned away to grab her ball from the return. Now that the moment was over, she felt awkward, but she refused to dwell on it. She focused on taking her turn. 

  
  


“This will be it,” Radko said, his fourth turn in a row to say the same words. 

“You sound so sure,” Mona said, trying to keep a laugh out of her voice. 

His paws shifted, adjusting his grip on the ball as he turned around to give her a fangy smirk. “Every time I say it is one time closer to being right.”

At that, she did laugh. “Go on, then,” she said, gesturing from her seat behind the return. “Get your strike.”

Tail twitching in amusement and concentration, Radko turned to face the lane again. Mona leaned slightly to see around him, her eyes following his actions with rapt attention. He had started out lagging far behind her in score, but they were now two-thirds through their first game, and Radko was clearly getting the hang of it. 

As Mona looked on in silence, Radko adjusted his foot positioning and stared down the pins at the far end of the lane. Though his face was hidden from her angle, she knew by the forward set of his ears how focused he was.

Radko took his few running steps, his approach and his backswing much more polished than they had been at the beginning. He slid to a stop just before the lane itself, letting the ball go almost on the ground, and it flew down the lane, quick and straight. Mona found herself leaning forward in anticipation as she watched the ball travel, a little straighter than most of his previous throws. It struck the pins just to the right of the center, hard and fast, with a satisfying crash. Almost at once, the majority of them fell; the one in the back left tottered for a moment before falling, but the one in the middle of the front was untouched. 

Radko turned back quickly to grin at her. “So close!” he exclaimed, and Mona was about to respond when she saw, over his shoulder, one of the fallen pins spin away from the mass, just right to knock into the front one. “Look!” she said, pointing, and Radko turned back around just too late to see it fall over. For a second he was still, and Mona wondered if he saw it, but then he leapt in the air with a whoop.

“YES!” he yelled, bouncing in place on his paws, his shoes clacking softly on the floor. He turned, still bouncing, and yelled, “I got it! Finally!” right before losing his footing and falling gracelessly on his ass.

Mona got up and hastened to check on him, but he started laughing almost immediately, and by the time she got to him, she was laughing too. “Are you okay?” she asked, more out of politeness than any actual concern.

“I’m great,” he said, his grin as bright as the midday sky. “That only hurt a little. I probably deserved it. Give a paw, will you?”

“Will a hoof suffice?” she quipped, reaching down to help him up. His grin grew sharper with amusement as he took it, and as she pulled him to his feet he practically launched himself off the floor, crashing into her on the way up and almost causing her to lose her balance as well. He recovered quickly and stepped just far enough back that they were not touching, but not quite far enough to be out of her space, the mischievous look on his face telling her that it had been intentional. “Thanks,” he said cheekily, and then before their proximity could make things awkward again, he turned and breezed past her, announcing again, “I got my strike!”

Laughing fondly, Mona followed him back to the return. 

  
  


Radko didn’t get another strike that game, though he didn’t let that dampen his enthusiasm. At first he seemed impatient for his ball to return between throws, but then he took to filling the short wait with walking back over to Mona to chat instead. For a moment she considered telling him that he could go find another, identical ball so that he wouldn’t have to wait for the ball to return, but then decided to leave it alone. They were both happy enough commenting on each others’ turns and catching up on life. 

When their first game ended, they agreed on a second one.

“I want to grab some food, though,” Radko said, pointing to the counter they had ignored earlier, which was the front to the alley’s own very small restaurant. “You get the next game going and I’ll get us some food? You want anything?”

Mona considered it. She wasn’t terribly hungry, but she could eat--and besides, they might be around for another couple of hours, and she knew her stomach would be complaining by then if she didn’t eat. She eyed the menu from the distance--it seemed that the place had a focus on tiny burgers--Speedy  _ Sliders, _ she recalled, giving a tiny huff of amusement. “Sure,” she said, standing up. “Get me something small, not too buggy please.”

“You got it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not gonna lie, I had a lot more fun writing this chapter than the previous date :)
> 
> T minus two chapters until the promised first kiss!


	33. In Which Mona Consults With Gezki

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the tardy update! I got a bit caught up with school things for a while there, oops!
> 
> Who's ready for another chapter of Mona angsting at Gezki?!? :D

_ Dating you is great and all, but I miss just hanging out with you normally. Want to come hang at my place this weekend? Just to chill? _

Mona set down her phone, briefly wondering just how many times she’d read the text. She knew how long it had been since it was sent--the tiny gray timestamp of “Yesterday at 3:07 pm” wouldn’t let her forget that--but there was no counter for the number of times she’d viewed it. She decided she was glad. She’d probably feel even crazier if she knew. 

Her thoughts had been going in circles since she’d gotten it. She couldn’t recall half of them; they were fleeting, popping up between classes, in the middle of homework, and at any other time her mind was idle. They all centered around two things: 

_ Am I really dating a predator? _

and

_ Do I want to be? _

Their third date--going to see a movie and then out for sorbet--had been just as fun as the first two, and Mona had, as before, gone along with it. The tenuous nature of their relationship had her noticing little things that she hadn’t before: the easy way he smiled at her, the particular set of his ears as he listened, the little sound his tail made as it whipped against his legs when he was excited. She found herself aware of him and the way he moved through the world in a different sort of way, and all of those little things tumbled through her head fleetingly as she went back over the same two thoughts again and again. 

_ Do I want to be? _

She picked up her phone again, closed the text conversation with Radko, and opened her dialer. A few taps later, she held the phone to her ear and waited as it rang.

“Hey Mona, what’s up?”

“Hi Gez, not much. Can I come over for a while?”

  
  


Mona walked in without knocking, ducking her head low as she stepped through the doorframe, and then she paused just inside and cautiously raised her head, just as she had last time. As before, her ears brushed the ceiling when she held them at normal height, but the top of her head had just an inch of clearance. 

“Mona? Is that you I hear creeping in my door?”

“I don’t creep,” Mona called back, laughing, and followed Gezki’s voice into the kitchen, ducking again as she passed through the doorway. The air smelled of fresh, hot tea, and she saw a mug already waiting for her at the table. She settled comfortably into the chair across from Gezki, glancing around the room. It was a little smaller than Gezki’s previous kitchen, but not cramped enough to make her uncomfortable. Gezki’s table and chairs were the same as before, but only two of the four chairs were at the table. 

Mona wrapped her hooves around the mug and stuck her nose in the steam, quietly basking in the aroma until it cooled enough to sip. 

“So,” Gezki said, settling comfortably into her own chair with a matching steaming mug in front of her, “Is it Radko or the annoying roommate?”

Mona cocked an ear, amused. “What makes you think I don’t just want to hang out?”

Gezki gave her a droll look. “When you want to hang out, you invite me to go out and do something. That, or try to get me to come visit you. When you want to talk, you ask to come over. You’re quite predictable, dear.”

Mona laughed. “Okay, you’ve got me.”

“So, which one is it?”

“Radko.” 

One of Gezki’s ears turned and flattened. “What did he do this time?” There was a tiny edge of dangerousness to her voice, which had Mona hastily shaking her head.

“Nothing.”

“Nothing wouldn’t have you sitting at my table.”

Mona sighed. Much as she appreciated Gezki’s knack for getting her troubles out of her, she felt like she was being interrogated, and she wasn’t even sure what she wanted to say. Resigning herself to answering Gezki’s questions until she figured it out, she said, “Fine. He sent me a text, and it got me thinking.” She pulled out her phone, unlocked it, opened the conversation, and slid it across the table for Gezki to look at. 

Gezki caught the phone easily and picked it up, holding it almost at arm’s length--Mona had the text enlarged as usual so she could read things on the screen without her glasses, but Gezki found the large text jarring to read up close. She read the latest text from Radko, scrolled up a little to check for context, and then set Mona’s phone back down in front of her, not offering to give it back just yet. “And? I don’t see a problem here.”

Mona considered making a snarky comment about Gezki being combative, but decided to hold it back. Maybe she’d caught her at a bad time. 

“It’s not a problem, it’s that...” She paused. “He said we’re dating.”

Gezki just raised an eyebrow. “Aren’t you?”

“No! Going on dates isn’t the same as  _ dating _ .”

Gezki snorted. “What’s the difference?”

“We aren’t  _ together _ . You don’t have to be together to just... go on dates.” She paused to sip her tea, and then just as Gezki opened her mouth to say something, added, “I’m worried he thinks we’re actually dating.”

Gezki shut her mouth, scratched her neck while she considered those words, and said, “So you don’t want to be actually dating him.”

“I don’t.”

Gezki frowned. “You do realize that at this point... you’re getting close to stringing him along, right?”

Mona groaned and leaned her cheek heavily on her right arm. “I don’t want to be,” She said, her words a little garbled, but she could tell that Gezki had understood. 

“Well, then you need to make up your mind, don’t you?”

Mona shot her a look. “You aren’t really helping,” 

Gezki huffed, clearly exasperated. “Fine, okay, let’s talk through it. Why don’t you want to be dating him?”

Mona grimaced. “Gezki, I’m an okapi.”

“And?”

“And he’s a hyena!” 

Silence fell over the table for a moment, until Gezki sat back to regard her. “You don’t want to be in an interspecies relationship?”

Mona shrugged, feeling even more under fire. “There’s a reason it’s so rare, right? Interspecies relationships just... I don’t know if I feel okay with it.”

Gezki smiled. “It’s a lot less rare than you think.” At Mona’s quizzical look, she added, “Most mammals date interspecies at least once. At least, the ones who aren’t bigoted traditionalists mostly do. It happens a lot. Connections are species-blind, and lots of mammals give it a shot nowadays.” She squinted and added, “Besides, don’t you remember that one time I dated that binturong?”

Mona started to shake her head, then stopped. “Wait, you mean back in middle school?”

“Well, I was a freshmen in high school at the time, but yes.”

Mona snorted. “I forgot all about her.”

“Well, anyway, there you go. It’s more normal than you think.”

“I guess I just haven’t heard much about it.” 

“No offense, Mona, but ungulates are a little bit infamous for being more likely to be traditionalist, and you kinda give off good-traditional-hoofed-girl vibes.”

Mona looked at her, a little offended. “I do not!”

“I’m not saying you  _ are _ a good traditional hoofed girl, you just kinda  _ seem _ like one when mammals don’t know you as well as I do. You probably know a lot of mammals who have dated interspecies, they just haven’t told you about it.”

“Because they thought I wouldn’t accept them?”

Gezki shrugged. “It’s just a guess.”

Again they were silent for a moment, and then Mona suddenly remembered another argument, and added, “Besides, I’ve always wanted to have calves one day...”

Gezki laughed. “Mona, c’mon, you can’t be serious.”

“I do!”

“I’m not doubting you, but did you forget that adoption and artificial insemination are a thing?”

Mona paused; momentarily, she had. Gezki read her pause correctly and laughed even harder. “Mona, you yourself are  _ both of those things _ , how do you forget that?”

Mona finally laughed too, the humor of the whole thing catching up with her. “Okay, okay,” she said once her laughter had subsided enough to speak, “You have a point.”

“Got any more arguments?”

Suddenly reminded that she was uneasy about the whole conversation, Mona stopped chuckling pretty quickly. “I don’t know,” she said softly.

“Well, are you having fun going out with him?”

“Yes.”

“Does the idea of having sex with him disgust you?”

Mona grimaced. “I don’t know if I’m ready to think that far ahead.”

“Okay, that’s fair. Does the idea of kissing him disgust you?”

Mona briefly tried to imagine it, and checked for her own mental response, but came up with nothing exceptionally positive or negative. “I guess not?”

“Okay, is there anyone else you’d  _ rather _ be dating right now?” 

Mona didn’t have to think about that; she’d formed no crushes beyond a passing admiration since moving to Zootopia. “No.”

“Okay, then. Why the hell are you holding back?”

Mona briefly went back over her thoughts, then shook her head. “I guess I don’t know.”

Gezki scooted her phone back across the table, then reached over and patted Mona’s hoof. “I’m not going to tell you to do something you don’t want to do, but I think you should think about it. And I think that if you want to keep him as a friend, you should either commit to this--at least for now--or turn him down before you keep going on dates.”

Mona nodded. “You’re right.”

“Now, text him back before he thinks you  _ died _ . You haven’t answered the boy for a whole  _ day _ .”

“Okay, okay,” she said, chuckling, and picked up her phone to do so.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> T-minus one chapter, y'all!


	34. In Which They Kiss

A week later, Mona knocked on Radko's door. Trepidation was making her chest feel a little tight, but she kept it carefully under control, and when he opened the door and grinned up at her, she smiled warmly in return.

“Come on in,” he said, stepping back to let her pass.

Mona stepped into his tiny living room, looking around with mild surprise. She realized abruptly that it had been a few months since she’d been over, but nonetheless she hadn’t expected his place to change much.

“You got a new couch,” she observed, pausing to admire it for a moment before she sat down. It was slightly smaller than his old couch, but seemed to be in decent enough shape, except for a bunch of small holes poked in one of the armrests.

“Yeah,” he said, and huffed out a tiny laugh. “Remember that bout of fleas I told you about? I couldn’t seem to get them out of the damn couch, so I had to get rid of it.”

“That’s too bad.”

“Yeah, it was an alright couch. This one is more comfortable, though. But I don’t know how to feel about the bite marks on that arm,” he said, gesturing to the one that Mona had just sat next to. “Lenny swears that they could only be from some couple fucking on the couch and biting down on it, but I kinda think he’s full of shit.” He paused, gave Mona’s look of surprise and disgust a sheepish look, and added, “I hope he’s full of shit, anyway. But there’s no weird smell to it, and it’s better than no couch.”

“I guess so.”

“Anyway, uh, are you hungry? I picked up a few things you like at the store.”

Mona smiled. “Not right now, but I’ll let you know later if I get hungry.”

“Want anything to drink?”

“Water would be nice.” She settled back into the couch, deliberately not thinking about its origins, and watched Radko scurry off to his little kitchen to get her a cup of water. She wasn’t terribly thirsty, but she always felt a little better in uncomfortable conversations with something to sip to give herself time to think.

“There you go,” he said softly, handing her the cup. He carefully sat down, and Mona noticed absently that he was sitting roughly the same distance from her that he had been the last few times she’d seen him--a carefully constructed space just big enough to fit another Mona into, just close enough to be familiar without crowding her.

She had a sneaking certainty that it was practiced, that distance. He was clearly trying so hard to do everything right, but it was his high success rate that had her starting to wonder just how much thought and preparation he’d put in over the summer.

“So, what did you want to talk about?”

Mona started out of her thoughts and realized that she was just staring at the water. She hastily took a sip and then forced herself to set it down on the coffee table. She folded her hooves in her lap and took a brief moment to find her words. Though she’d been going over and over what to say in her mind for the last week, she still wasn’t sure if the words she’d chosen were the right ones, or if they would even apply once the conversation got going.

No way to know but to jump right in.

“I want to talk about us,” she said, feeling a little of the anticipatory tightness in her chest release as she spoke the words. The first step was always the hardest. “About what we are to each other,” she added, and then inwardly winced at herself for going off of her over-thought script already.

“Okay,” Radko said gamely, but she could hear that the lightness in his voice was forced. She shelved that detail for later; the important thing now was to say what she needed to say.

“The truth is, I’m not quite sure what to tell you.” It was both a truth and a lie; she had constructed her talking points as carefully as though she was going to be speaking in front of the whole of Zootopia, but she still wasn’t sure that what she was going to say was the right thing. “I just want to say that I’ve been having fun, going out with you, but... I don’t want to hurt you.” She was trying to put pauses into her words at the right times to make them seem natural.

But she paused too long. “That’s okay,” Radko said, now studiously not looking at her, “It’s been fun, but we can just... go back to how we were before.”

She could tell how much he wanted her to believe he was sincere, how much he wanted to be sincere, but he was forcing the words out. “No,” she said quickly, “that’s not what I mean.”

He looked up at her, his eyes clouded.

“I mean...” Mona paused, then decided to return to her script for lack of a better idea of what to say. “It’s been fun, and I really like you. I probably wouldn’t have ever initiated anything but friendship with you, but... well, now that you’ve convinced me to go this far, I think I’d like to keep trying out the idea of being with you.”

Radko looked confused--head and ears cocked, but he had a tentative smile on his face, and he had turned most of his body to face her, knee up on the couch. Mona realized that what she’d said might not have made a lot of sense, so she hastily added, “I can’t promise it’s going to work out. I don’t think I’ll entirely know how I feel about the whole thing until we get there. I’ve never been attracted to a predator. And I just don’t want to hurt you, if it doesn’t work out.”

Radko was pondering her words, chewing lightly on his bottom lip, and Mona waited for more than a minute before her nerves got the better of her and she blurted, “I don’t think I’ll even know if I want to kiss you until it happens.” She immediately shut her mouth and tried to keep her face neutral, biting down painfully on her tongue to keep it still, horrified at her lack of filter.

Radko grinned. “We could always try it out now and see how it goes,” he said, part cocky, part hopeful, and just a little shy. Mona couldn’t help but find the combination adorable, and that made finding a response even harder.

“I--uh.”

“Sorry,” he said, laughing, looking down again, “Too soon, I know. but, uh, thanks for... saying all that.” He paused to chew on his lip again, then added, “So, um, what does this mean? I don’t want to, uh, interpret this the wrong way and freak you out.”

Mona thought for a moment. “Practically?”

“Yeah.”

“Well... Until now we’ve just been... well, going out as friends, really. We haven’t been _acting_ like a couple at all.”

“And you’d like to change that?” Radko’s ears were perked straight up, and his face was all hope.

“Yeah.”

“Even though you’re still not sure about the whole thing? Don’t get me wrong, I love the idea, but I don’t want--” he waved a paw, “You know.”

“If you have a better idea, I’m all ears,” she said, reaching up and tugging on her left ear, which made him snicker. “Like I said, I don’t want to hurt you, so if you’d rather approach this differently...”

He shrugged. “I’ll let you know if I think of anything, I guess.”

They sat in silence for a moment, looking at each other, and an awkwardness descended over the couch. Mona reached for her water and took a sip, not quite meeting Radko’s eyes but not looking away from him either. He was doing the same, his eyes darting between her face and her hooves cautiously.

“Well, I was thinking about inviting you out to a kinda fancy dinner soon,” Radko said after almost a full minute, “Does that sound like a nice idea?”

Mona nodded with a shrug. “Yes, but...”

“But?”

She could feel her face and ears heating up at just the thought of what she was going to say, and for a moment she wasn’t sure whether she would be able to convince the words to leave her lips, but she forced herself because she knew the idea, as awkward as it felt to say, was a useful one.

“Maybe we _should_ try kissing,” she said tentatively, and watched Radko’s ears shoot up in surprise. “Like I said, I don’t know for sure how I’ll feel about it, and I don’t want to lead you on any more than necessary...”

“Oh you don’t have to talk me into it,” he said quickly, scooting a little closer on the couch, his paws up as though he wanted to reach out, but trepidatiously hovering still within his own space. “Can I...?”

“Yes,” she said, and remembering the carefully constructed distance between them, added, “You don’t have to be so careful about my space.”

“Thank fuck,” he said with an amused huff, “It’s been hard to.” He scooted closer again, and Mona sat still and let him come; she observed an excited tremble in his paws, and the rapid but soft tapping of his tail against the cushion. He kept shifting closer until his knee came in contact with hers, then stopped. He reached out slowly, and one paw found her arm as he leaned forwards. He paused there, and Mona realized that he was already close to the extent that he could lean from where he was.

Suddenly unsure if she wanted to go through with this, but unwilling to back down without seeing it through, she shifted until she was facing him more directly and leaned in. She paused briefly to look at him when their faces were only inches apart. His face was blurry so close up, but not so blurry that she couldn’t see the earnestness in his eyes, and the softness of his expression. She let herself take a moment to study his face, and watched a small smile spread over his muzzle.

Radko reached up to touch her cheek. “It’s okay,” he whispered his paw pads brushing her fur so softly it almost tickled, “We don’t have to.”

Mona almost laughed from the nervous tension. Almost. She held her breath until the urge passed, only a second or so, and then whispered back, “Just taking my time.”

Radko laughed briefly, a hot wash of air on her face, and the laugh she had tamped down a moment before snuck out, and a moment later they were both laughing, foreheads pressed together, Radko's paw fallen gently to her shoulder, and then the moment after that she raised her head and he his, and in the middle of the sheepish grin he gave her, she leaned that final inch and kissed him.

Radko's mouth was strange to her; it was close to the size she was used to, but he had less lip and more fur, and she found the short, bristly whiskers tickly on her muzzle. She let her eyes stay open; though she couldn't see well enough up close to make watching his face worthwhile, she would prefer to have warning if he decided to do something unexpected. He broke the kiss after a couple of seconds, only to press a few more, shorter ones to her lips immediately, and Mona reciprocated gently. He paused, only an inch away, and his eyes slid open to study hers. Mona's mind was blank for a moment, and then she realized that her heart was racing, a tight excitement in her chest, mixed with half-melted apprehension.

Determined to complete the test before she could think herself out of it, she closed the gap between them again. She felt Radko scoot a little closer without breaking the kiss, his knee overlapping hers, and reminded herself to lean forward to keep him from having to stretch. Not to be distracted, she let her lips part just far enough to let the tip of her tongue snake out. Radko immediately responded with a surprised “Mmf!”and opened his mouth as well, his tongue lapping forward, and again, three, four--

Mona pushed her tongue a little further into his mouth to forestall the unexpected licking, and he seemed to understand what she was doing; he let the pace slow until they were slowly, cautiously exploring each other. Radko's tongue was wide and flat, clumsy but enthusiastic, his teeth strange and sharp. He tasted differently than he smelled, but still with a sharp tang she had never encountered before.

After many long seconds, they broke apart. Radko, who had been holding his breath, let out a rush of air and then grinned at her, his eyes brighter than she'd seen. They both leaned back to normal, and just stared at each other.

“Mm,” Radko mumbled to himself, and licked his lips. “So, uh, what do you think?”

“It was different,” Mona said pensively. She considered the light fluttering of her heart, the taste still on her tongue, and the sensations, fresh in her mind and yet blurred into one big mess by the heat of the moment. As she tried to think of what else to say, she refocused on Radko and realized that he looked concerned.

She reached out and took his paw. “I think I can get used to it, though,” she said, and watched his face light up like the sun.

 

 

Mona, had she no memory of the last hour, wouldn’t have known anything had changed; Radko didn’t try to hold her hoof, didn’t try for another kiss, didn’t speak to her any differently than he usually did as he offered to make her a sandwich.

But since she did have her memory, and she knew to look for the difference, the effect was obvious. His smiles were brighter, his movements made loose by happiness, and when he sat down next to her on the couch, his paws pulled up to sit cross-legged, he idly let his knee rest on her thigh.

“This okay?” he asked, handing her the plate.

“It’s what I asked for, isn’t it?” She took it and gingerly sniffed the simple sandwich Radko had made her; it was, in fact, exactly what she had requested.

“No, I mean this,” he said, nodding downwards and briefly lifting his knee before letting it rest comfortably against her thigh again.

“Oh. Yes, that’s perfectly fine,” she said, and took a bite of the sandwich as Radko grabbed his laptop and started typing something into Zoogle. The contact was comfortable and casual, asking nothing but for her to stay there; and if she was a little overly aware of the gentle pressure, well, that wasn’t a bad thing.

She chewed as she mulled everything over, and once again considered the newly dispelled carefully constructed space. Though she had been grateful for it while she took the time to process his feelings and how she felt about them, it was now a relief to have it gone, to have Radko back to his easy mannerisms and comfortable closeness.

She swallowed the bite. “I have a question.”

He glanced up from the screen. “Yeah?”

“Over the summer, you went from being--” a space invader, as Gezki would put it, she thought, but decided against the phrase, “--always in my space, to always staying just far enough away for me to feel comfortable,” She remarked. “But I never actually said anything about it. How did you know to do that?”

“Er.” Looking distinctly uncomfortable, he looked back down at the screen, unfocused, his paws motionless on the keyboard. “I didn’t want to be--I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable or push you away. After I learned that I was being a space invader, and how rude that is by okapi standards, I made myself back off.”

She blinked at his choice of words. “How’d you come to realize?”

“I, er. I did research?”

She squinted at him, trying to make her expression a little more playful than accusatory. “You’re lying.”

He groaned and leaned far back against the couch cushions, putting a paw over his eyes, the laptop sliding down onto the seat beside him, forgotten. “Okay, okay, but please don’t be mad at me.”

“Why?”

“Because I went to Gezki.”

She blinked. Space invader suddenly clicked, and she flicked her ears in astonishment. “You went to Gezki?”

He peeked at her from under his paw, then hid his eyes again. “Look, I--I knew I fucked up somehow, but I couldn’t figure out what exactly I did, and you were clearly too busy and too upset to tell me yourself. I figured that if I was ever going to get you to give me another chance, I had to make sure to do everything right the next time I saw you. I tried to look up okapi customs online a little bit, but… I didn’t find a whole lot that I could use to figure out what was wrong. So, I figured… if anyone could tell me, other than you, it would be her.” He finally took his paw off his eyes and lifted his head to look at her. “Please don’t be mad?”

Mona wasn’t quite sure how to feel about the information, but anger wasn’t one of the mix in her mind, so she shrugged. “Honestly, I might be impressed.”

“Impressed?”

“You’re scared of her, but you sought her out anyway. And I’m willing to bet she mocked you at least a little.”

“Did she ever!” He paused, seemed to realize what else she’d said, and added, “And I am not scared of her!”

“Fine, intimidated, then.”

He crossed his arms, but he was grinning. “Am not.”

“Well you were last spring, anyway.”

He huffed and uncrossed his arms, clearly defeated. “Okay fine, a little.”

“You really couldn’t find anything about okapis online?”

Radko shrugged. “I found some, but a lot of it was… well, probably written for other okapis. I kept feeling like there was something I was missing, that you’d probably think was obvious. And even the parts that made sense… I wasn’t sure how to tie any of it to what was going on with us. I waffled on it for a couple of weeks, but… I figured that if I didn’t start doing something right when you came back, I’d lose any chance I might have had. So, I finally got on Furbook and found Gezki, and sent her a message. I’m really glad she’s got a unique first name.”

Mona snorted, amused. “What did she think of that?”

“At first, she didn’t seem like she believed me, and at one point she asked me if I was pranking her. But I was just like, ‘No, for real, I need help here, and you might be the only mammal who can help me,’ and she finally agreed to help me out.”

“I guess she told you what you needed to know?”

“Fuck, did she ever. I swear, she told me to come over to her new place, and she sat me down, and she had notes. She had like, a whole lesson plan laid out in front of me.”

“Wait, really?”

“Yes! She had titled it 'Mona Wooing 101’ and she had categories and stuff.”

"You're kidding."

"I almost wish I was!"

Mona smiled. "So, what kind of rigamarole did she put you through?"

"Heh. Rigamarole. I like that word." At Mona's raised eyebrow, he continued, "Well, the first sheet of notes was entitled 'You Done Fucked Up,'--" he paused to grin in response to Mona's snort, --"and she spent about two hours explaining everything you'd told her, and asking me about my view of things, and generally setting the record straight. I'm glad she did, because on my own I don't think I would have managed to suss out half of the things she told me. She helped me with which parts were offenses to your Okapi sensibilities, and which were, in her words, 'Just plain rude.'"

"Okapi sensibilities," Mona repeated, shaking her head.

"Again, her words, not mine."

Mona chuckled. "Okay. Go on, then."

"Well, once she finshed telling me all that, she told me to head home, and come back next time with a general idea of what I wanted to say in my apology."

"Wow, she even gave you homework."

"I know, right? The injustice. Anyway, I came back a week later with my thoughts on that, and she listened to them and told me where my thinking wasn't going in the right direction. Then, she sat me down again for the next installment."

"Which was?"

"Okapi culture and customs, with a heavy dose of your personality and your preferences, and all the things I need to keep in mind so that I wouldn't make you feel creeped out again."

Mona winced. "I hope that wasn't too grueling."

"Actually, it wasn't too bad. So much of it boiled down to learning to stay out of your personal space and how to watch for your boundaries."

"I thought there was something intentional to the gap you're always leaving between us."

He grinned. "That was part of it, yeah." He paused, looked down at their knees, and then added, "I didn't realize how big the difference is in how touchy our species are. By hyena standards, I was being almost distant with you. The fur club night was the first time I… well, acted like a normal hyena who's trying to show some interest."

"Romantic interest, you mean?"

"Yeah." He smiled sheepishly. "I guess it was a bit much for you, though."

Mona nodded, and fought off another wince. "That whole evening was… a bit much."

"I'm sorry," he said earnestly, and gently set a paw on her arm. "I really didn't mean for that to go so badly."

Mona smiled. "It's okay, really. I probably won't be looking back fondly on the memory any time soon, but I know now that you didn't mean any harm by it."

"Let's just, uh, quietly forget it happened and not repeat the accident, yeah?"

That made Mona laugh. "Sure," she said, happy to leave the topic of that night.

Radko returned to his laptop, pulling up Nutflix--"Are you sure it's okay to use Gezki's account?" "Yes I'm sure, I asked her."--and went looking for something to watch.

Radko picked an older superhero movie that they had both seen before, and they sat back to watch. Mona ate her sandwich slowly and let the movie take half her attention, Radko as firmly in the corner of her mind as he was in the corner of her vision. He made comments occasionally, glancing up at her and smiling as she responded, but for the most part they sat in comfortable quiet and let the movie play.

Halfway through, in a lull as the main character--a wolf with super strength--crept through an abandoned facility, Mona gently let her attention drift away entirely. She looked at Radko without turning her head. He was intensely focused; she supposed that the scene was supposed to be tense, but since she remembered how it turned out, she felt unaffected.

She had finished her sandwich, so she set the plate on the couch on the other side of her and then turned her attention back to Radko. She realized that she had an opportunity, and so she reached over and gently touched the bristly fur at the edge of his ear.

He jumped, whipped his head around, and when he saw the startled look on her face and her hoof, arrested in midair, he laughed.

"Sorry," he said, "You snuck up on me, there." He resumed his position, putting his ear back within an inch of her hovering hoof, and said, "You can go ahead."

Mona, almost as spooked as he had been, talked herself out of abandoning the motion. She reached out that last inch and gently grasped the edge of his ear, running her fingers along his fur until she got to the tip, where she let her grip slip off. The fur on his ear was stiff, but softer than it looked, and she experimentally ran a finger back through it the other way, making him twitch violently and clasp a paw over his mouth to keep a laugh from bursting out.

"Sorry," she said, putting her hoof down, not sure whether to be amused or apologetic. He didn't exactly look uncomfortable now, once his twitch had subsided.

"It's okay, it just tickled." He reached up and rubbed his own paw over the same ear to dispell the sensation, then grinned up at her. He didn't ask why, and she didn't offer an explanation, but when they turned back to the movie, she quietly reached an arm around his shoulders and applied gentle pressure until he leaned over and settled against her side. The last little apprehensive part squirming in her chest slowly quieted as she took in the calming pressure of the comfortable weight of him. His smaller size made him fit well under her arm, and she secretly enjoyed the silly smile he couldn't seem to wipe from his muzzle as he kept his eyes very intentionally on the little screen.

It was comfortable, in a way that went much deeper than physical comfort, and she decided then that she had no desire to leave the little bubble of contentment that they had built in the middle of the slightly dubious couch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HI Y'ALL WAS THAT AWKWARD ENOUGH?
> 
> Edit: I decided that these two sections didn't make sense as their own chapters. Enjoy :)


	35. In Which Sarah Strikes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IF YOU HAVEN'T READ THE SECOND HALF OF THE PREVIOUS CHAPTER (just posted less than an hour before this one) GO BACK AND READ THAT FIRST.

Mona dug in the back of her closet for her duffel bag, hoping her memory was correct. Her hoof closed around it, and she pulled it out with difficulty; it was wedged between a box of hers and a box of Sarah's.

Bag in hand, she got up off the floor and went to drop it on her bed. It was half unzipped, and she was glad to see that she had, in fact, remembered to bring her denim dress back with her. It was rumpled and dusty, but that was nothing a good wash wouldn't fix.

She shook it out a little and laid it across the foot of her bed, then pulled her phone out of her pocket to text Radko. _I found it,_ she typed, and then added, _you're sure it's not too casual?_

He texted back promptly. _Totally sure. The place isn't dress-code-fancy. I'm not that rich._

Mona laughed, secretly glad. She wouldn't know how to act in a restaurant fancy enough to actually have a dress code.

 

 

"What are you getting all dolled up for? Got a date?"

Mona blinked and set down her phone, turning off the screen to close the camera, which she'd been using to inspect her face fur for neatness. She considered lying or deflecting, but after a moment decided that it couldn't be worth it.

She looked up at Sarah and smiled. "Yes, actually."

"I've never seen another okapi hanging around here," Sarah remarked, and Mona felt a tiny prickle of tension crawl up her spine, but ignored it. It crossed her mind to say, 'That's because I don't invite my friends to my dorm without consulting my roommate,' but she pushed the urge aside. She just shrugged in response, and as she assumed, Sarah's taciturn nature meant that she didn't question it any further.

Mona kept an eye on her phone, expecting a text saying that Radko was waiting downstairs, but to her surprise, a knock at their door came first. She looked at Sarah, who was looking at her and making no move to get up and answer it, so she stood and went herself.

As she suspected she would, she opened the door on Radko's smiling face. He was dressed in the same outfit he'd had on when he had showed up at the beginning of the semester to apologize, but with his mane gelled a little taller than it had been that day.

She smiled at him, but instead of a hello, said, "How do you keep getting past the RA?"

He laughed. "When I'm dressed nicely, I can tailgate right in and they don't look twice at me," he said cheerfully. He glanced down at her dress and said, "You ready to go?"

"You have GOT to be kidding me."

Mona and Radko both froze.

"You're going on a date with the hyena?"

Radko, without moving, looked up at her and locked onto her gaze. For a moment that couldn't have been more than seconds, they shared the sort of communication that only two mammals on the edge of panic could feel.

"I can't believe you, Mona," Sarah said, her voice low and thick with disgust. "Here I thought you were a decent mammal."

Mona saw the moment Radko's eyes lit up with rage, his fur bristling just enough to give him a jagged look. His eyes darted to the left, then back up to lock on Mona's, and there was a question in his eyes.

"I can't believe you've been a cross-breeder this whole time," Sarah said, and Mona heard her move closer. She quickly turned her head far enough to see Sarah in her peripheral vision, and felt a prickle up her spine stronger than the ones she was already feeling, her chest a tight knot of fear and anger that made her want to run, or to kick out, but kept her frozen in suspension between her instincts.

Her eyes off Radko, she didn't see the snap in him until he sidestepped around her, a snarl of rage twisting his muzzle into something fearsome, and growled out, "What's it to you, you sorry sack of shit?"

Mona's hoof shot out before she could even get a thought together, and she grabbed his shoulder just as Sarah moved close enough for her angry snort to be felt on the back of Mona's head. Radko stilled under her touch, and once more his eyes found her face and stayed there, but she could feel him vibrating with rage.

She squeezed Radko's shoulder, then firmly pulled on his shoulder until he acquiesced and turned away. She gently steered him out of the door, her mind a rush of white noise that blocked out the insults Sarah was spitting at their backs, and then the click of the closing door abruptly cut it off and plunged them into silence.

A beat later, Radko broke the quiet by taking in a ragged breath. Mona realized that she could hear Sarah ranting behind the door. She shook her head hard enough to make her ears flap, trying to restore her mind to a state of calm, and looked down at Radko.

He was looking up at her, breathing raggedly, his face a pained expression that was half rage, half worry. As their eyes met again, he stepped forward to lay a paw on her arm, and said quietly, "Are you okay?"

Mona nodded. She felt tense and uncomfortable all over, but the intensity of the situation had left. "Are you?"

Radko didn't answer with words, but he closed the distance between them and grasped Mona in a crushing hug. She hugged him back, and for several seconds they stood there, the tight press of their embrace just enough to block out the world.

Radko finally let go, stepped back, and smiled up at her. "I am now." There was still a tightness in his face, and his fur wasn't as neatly groomed as it had been when he'd arrived, but the rage had bled out of him.

"Come on, let's get out of here," Mona said, and they headed to the elevator.

They got to the sidewalk in front of the building before Mona realized that she had forgotten her phone and wallet. She sighed and looked back up at the building as she told Radko.

"Do we need to go back?"

She shook her head. "As long as I can pay you back later for my half of dinner?" She turned to walk towards the bus stop, and Radko quickly fell in beside her.

Radko shrugged. "You really don't need to--"

She nudged him with her elbow. "I still want to."

He nodded. "Okay, yeah." He paused, hesitation clearly on his face, then added, "You still want to go?"

Mona stopped and studied him. He seemed a little ruffled still, and a little downtrodden, but she couldn't read anything else from him.

Surely he didn't think something like that could give her second thoughts?

"As long as you do," she said, and then when he glanced at her, said, "I'm not going to let my stupid bigot of a roommate spoil our nice evening."

That got a real smile back on his face, and they turned and kept walking.

 

 

Mona was halfway through her meal of grilled vegetables when Radko put down his fork, took a drink, and said quietly, "So, uh, the thing that happened earlier. With your roommate."

Mona set down her fork as well. "I'm sorry about her."

He waved a paw. "Don't be. You don't control what she does. But, uh, I guess that reminded me that we should probably talk about, well… visibility?"

Not sure she followed, Mona cocked an ear and said, "Visibility?"

"Well, um. I think we need to decide whether we're okay with mammals… knowing that we're dating." He subtly dropped his voice on the last word, as though he could food an eavesdropper by obscuring just one word. "I don't mean close friends--I imagine Gezki already knows…"

"Yeah, she does," Mona said, smiling sheepishly.

"And I'm not planning to keep it from my friends--at least, not the ones I think would be cool with it."

"But you're saying we need to decide if we're okay with being obvious in public, or if we'd rather keep it under wraps?"

"Exactly."

Mona sat back and let her gaze drift off his face as she considered the matter. "You're right, we should decide that." She glanced over his shoulder and around the restaurant, but it was a quiet time of day--the middle of the afternoon, when few mammals were out eating fancy food--and there was no one near enough to overhear them. She took a moment to look behind her as well, but saw the same.

Radko, seeing her attention returned, said, "Personally, I don't really mind. But my species has a dirty reputation even for a predator, so I'm kinda used to random strangers being assholes to me. I don't want to make you uncomfortable, though, so I'm perfectly fine with keeping it casual in public if you prefer."

Mona tapped on the tabletop briefly as she thought. "Well, I'm not very… publicly demonstrative. even in relationships with okapis, I have never been very interested in public affection."

"Mhmm."

"I imagine that we'll get some negativity from strangers if mammals notice we're a couple, but I sort of doubt they will. I've always been one to keep most of that to alone time."

"No kiss hello?" Radko said, a twinkle in his eye.

She shrugged. "Well, I guess I do like little things like that sometimes." She didn't try to hide the tiny, shy smile that pulled at her lips.

He snorted softly. "It's not like I would be wanting to make out with you or get pawsy in public," he said. "I'm not one to be shy, but that kind of thing is better enjoyed away from an audience, you know?"

Mona could feel a slight blush creeping up her ears, but chose to ignore it. "Yes, I agree."

"So, what do you say about the little stuff, though?"

Mona hadn't expected the conversation to come up so soon, but she'd already thought of it, so her answer came easily. "I'd rather keep it subtle, at least for now. I'm still adjusting to this whole thing, so I would prefer to keep it uncomplicated. But we don't need to go out of our way to hide it."

"Sure thing," he said easily, smiling as he picked his fork back up.

"You're sure you're okay with hiding?"

He shrugged. "I still get to spend quality time with you either way. I'm not bothered."

Mona smiled. "That's true. Thank you."

He just grinned at her, and returned to his meal.

 

 

Mona successfully banished thoughts about Sarah and her outburst throughout their dinner, but once they left, she found herself forced to remember, and heaved a sigh.

Radko looked at her curiously. "Something wrong?"

She glanced around, found a bench, and went to sit on it, Radko following. Once settled, she said, "I just remembered that I have to go back home."

"And deal with Sarah?"

"And deal with Sarah."

Radko grimaced. "Stay with Gezki?"

She shook her head. "Her new place is too small. I can barely even sit on the couch she has now. I wouldn't get any sleep."

He shifted as though nervous and said, "I know it's pretty far from home for you, but you could stay with me?"

She blinked. "Isn't it a bit early for… that?"

"Oh no, I don't mean like that. Completely casual. One of us can sleep on the couch." At her raised eyebrows, he explained, "I was going to offer my bed to you, if you want it. It's a little more comfortable."

Mona took a moment to consider. It was Friday, so she had plenty of time to make it back for class on Monday.

"What time is it?"

Radko checked his phone. "Almost four."

She sighed as she thought about what she would have to do. She couldn't continue living with Sarah after this.

"Okay, let's get moving. I'll explain my plan while we walk. There's not a lot of time left."

Radko's face showed confusion, but he sprang up quickly.

"Okay, so here's my plan. I need to put in a roommate change request, and the student housing office closes at five, so that's why we're talking and walking. I would rather not wait until monday to start the process of getting away from Sarah."

"That's smart, I was wondering if you could do anything about that."

"Do you have unlimited data?"

"Yes?"

"Can I borrow your--" she stopped talking suddenly. "Actually, I need you to Zoogle some stuff for me while we walk. My hooves won't work on your phone screen."

"Okay?" He pulled out his phone, baffled but willingly going along with what she was saying. She silently reminded herself to thank him for his agreeableness later.

She rattled off instructions of what to type in and, after he read the results off to her, she told him what to tap on. After the first minute of this, he reached up and hooked his paw around her arm to guide himself without having to look up.

Once he found the appropriate online document, she had him turn the text size up 400% and then took his phone and let him guide her while she read. They were almost back to campus, and she had only about thirty-five minutes before the office closed and she would have to wait until monday.

She gave his phone back after another five minutes, heaving a sigh.

"So what were you looking for there?" he asked, pocketing it.

"Checking the anti-discrimination policy. If interspecies relationships were protected by the university, I could tell the truth about what she said. But there isn't. If I am truthful, I'll be at the mercy of the opinions of the mammal at the housing office."

"Meaning what?"

"I could get full support and have the issue resolved quickly, or I might get kicked out of the university altogether." At Radko's alarmed face, she said, "That's the worst case scenario, but I can't risk it. Thankfully, that document did say that they can't require me to give details if I ask for a roommate change on a hate speech case."

Mona looked around, finally focusing on her surroundings, and Radko let his paw fall from her arm. "Oh, the office is this way," she said, and they took a right.

"So, do you want me to say anything, or should I just stay quiet? I could back you up?"

Mona huffed softly. "Actually, I think it would be best if you wait outside." She stopped walking; the building she needed to go to was the next one down. "I don't want to risk someone putting two and two together."

Radko nodded. "So, I'll be on that bench?" He pointed to a nearby bench whose legs were half-lost in leaf litter.

Mona smiled. "That would be great."

"I'll see you soon?" He held out his arms, offering a hug, and she stepped forward and leaned down to accept it.

"Soon," she agreed when they let go, and then she turned and headed for the door.

 

 

Mona stepped into the building's lobby and paused. She'd only been in the student housing office once, and she had to think briefly to remember which way to go.

She set off down a short hallway to her left, and then opened the last door on the right. A loris looked up from the front desk and smiled at her.

"How may I help you?"

"I want to put in a roommate change request."

"Okay, let me pull up the database." A few clicks later, she said, "Name?"

"Mona Johnstoni."

The loris's expression immediately changed. "Oh, you're the okapi."

Mona's entire chest clenched. "I'm sorry?"

"Your roommate has already been in here to ask the same thing," she explained, her friendly tone entirely gone. "I guess you want to confirm her request."

"Ah… yes?"

"I'll make a note," the loris said snappily. Everything from her tone to her expression had become angry, and Mona found herself horrified as she realized that Sarah had to have told this loris something to make her act so.

"Anything else?"

"No, thank you."

"Good day, then."

Mona turned and, heart pattering in her chest, left the building.

She found Radko right where she'd left him, shuffling his feet through the leaf litter and kicking it into grooves, his attention off in space somewhere. He perked up when he saw her approach, but his expression became one of worry when he saw her face.

"Was it bad?" He made to get up, but Mona moved directly to the bench and sat next to him, so he settled back down.

"Sarah had already been there."

"Oh."

"I don't know what she said, but the receptionist definitely wasn't friendly once she learned who I was."

"That… seems bad."

Mona sighed. "I don't know what she said, and right now I can't do anything about it, so I'm not going to worry." Radko smiled encouragingly, so she continued. "I need to go get a couple changes of clothes and my phone and wallet, and then… I guess I'm going to stay with you for the weekend?"

"That's perfectly fine with me."

"Okay. So then, when I get back for Monday classes, I'll see if they'll be ready to move one of us out yet."

"Do you think they will be?"

Mona shrugged. "I've never had to do this before, or talked to anyone who has. I don't know how long it'll take."

"Well, I know savannah central isn't convenient, but you can crash at my place for as long as you need."

"Thank you," she said, secretly wondering if she'd even want to take him up on the offer for more than a couple of days--but she needed to cross that bridge when she got to it.

"So, are we dropping back by your dorm?"

"Yes. Let's get this over with."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELLO AGAIN EVERYONE! Sorry it's been so long! I told myself I was going to write so much over the winter break, and then I got myself so busy with trying to get everything done that I didn't have time for during the semester, and... no writing happened. 
> 
> But here I am back now, and hoping I will get the train chugging again :)
> 
> Besides keeping myself extra busy over break, I was also stressing about money for most of it. Trying to get hours at either of my workplaces has been nigh impossible for a few months now, and since I live in a college town, winter break means the slow season... and even fewer hours. It's been an awful pile of stress and nope. Vet bills for my darling pigeon have made that even worse. It looks like I might finally have it under control, but it'll take a while to crawl out from under the debt of the last few months. 
> 
> Anyway, I am oversharing so you'll understand this: I made a ko-fi account recently, and if you feel like tossing a couple bucks my way, I would appreciate it greatly. No obligation! I'll be surprised if anybody does, honestly. Your support for my writing is the most valuable thing you can give, anyway. I love everyone who comments (or just kudos and then ninjas away (or logs out to re-kudos every time I post a chapter)), and I plan to see this thing through to the end. 
> 
>  
> 
> [Here be that ko-fi link :)](https://ko-fi.com/wootzel)
> 
>  
> 
> Thanks so much for reading!


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